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ST. PAUL, MINN. 


filtered at St. Paul Post Office as Second Class Matter. 






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MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 






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MY 


UNCLE BENJAMIN 

BY 

CLAUDE 'tILLIER 


Translated from the French by 

BENJ. R. TUCKER 

\ 


With a Sketch of the Author’s Eife and Works by 
LUDWIG PFAU 



ST. PAUL 

The Price-McGill Company 

350-352 SIBLEY vSTREET 


Copyrighted 1890 

BY 

BENJ. R. TUCKER. 


Copyrighted 1892 

BY 

THE PRTCE-McGILL CO. 


CONTENTS. 


Page 

Translator’s Preface 5 


Chapter I. 

Who my uncle was 7 

Chapter II. 

Why my uncle decided to marry 20 

Chapter III. 

How my uncle meets an old sergeant and a poodle dog, 

which prevents him from going to M. Minxit’s .... 29 

Chapter IV. 

How my uncle passed himself off for the Wandering Jew . . 69 

Chapter V. 

My uncle works a miracle 76 

Chapter VI. 

Monsieur Minxit 81 

Chapter VII. 

Table talk at M. Minxit’s 92 

Chapter VIII. 

How .my uncle kissed a marquis 107 

Chapter IX. 

M. JMinxit prepares for war 119 

Chapter X. 

How my uncle made the marquis kiss him 127 


CONTENTS. 


Page 

Chapter XI. 

How my uncle helped his tailor to seize him -138 

Chapter XII. 

How my uncle hung M. Susurrans to a hook in his kitchen . 153 
Chapter XIII. 

How my uncle spent the night in prayer for his sister’s safe 

delivery 172 

Chapter XIV. 

My uncle’s speech before the bailiff 182 

Chapter XV. 

How my uncle was arrested by Parlaiita in the performance 

of his functions as godfather, and put in prison .... 194 

Chapter XVI. 

A breakfast in prison. — How my uncle got out of prison . . 199 

Chapter XVII. 

A trip to Corvol 212 

Chapter XVIII. 

What my uncle said to himself regarding dueling .... 223 
Chapter XIX. 

How my uncle thrice disarmed M. de Pont-Casse .... 243 
Chapter XX. 

Abduction and deatii of Mile. Minxit 2o3 

Chapter XXI. 

A final festival 261 


Appendix. 

Claude Tillier 276 


TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE. 


’ I KESUEKECT a buried treasure ; a novel unlike any 
other, by an author unlike any other ; a novel, as 
Charles Monselet says, that “ has no equivalent in the 
literature of this century”; a novel which, despite the 
pessimism with which it opens and the pathos with 
which it closes, — yes, even in these, — must take rank 
among the wittiest and most humorous ever written; 
a novel of philosophy, of progress, of reality, of human- 
ity; a novel of the heart and of the head; a npvel 
that is less a work of art than a work of genius, — the 
work of an obscure genius, a child of the French Revo- 
lution, /who lived and died early in the nineteenth 
century and will be famous early in the twentieth. 


Benj. R. Tucker. 




MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


CHAPTER 1. 

' WHO MY UNCLE WAS. 

I REALLY do not know why man so clings to life. 
What does he find that is so agreeable in this insipid 
succession of nights and days, of winter and spring? 
Always the same sky, the same sun ; always the same 
green pastures and the same yellow fields ; always the 
same speeches of the crown, the same knaves and the 
same dupes. If this is the best that God could do, he 
is a sorry workman, and the scene-shifter at the Grand 
Opera is cleverer than he. 

More personalities, you say ; there you are now, in- 
dulging in personalities against God. What do you 
expect ? To be sure, God is a functionary and a high 
functionary too, although his functions are not a sine- 
cure. But I am not afraid that he will sue me in the 
courts for damages, wherewith to build a church, as a 
compensation for the injury that I may have done to his 
honor. 

I know very well that the court officials are more 
sensitive in regard to his reputation than he is himself ; 
but it is precisely that of which I complain. By virtue 
of what title do these men in black arrogate to them- 
selves the right to avenge injuries which are wholly 
personal to him? Have they a power of attorney 
signed by Jehovah that authorizes them? 


8 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


Do you believe that he is highly pleased when the 
police magistrates take in hand his thunderbolts and 
launch them brutally upon the unfortunate for an 
offence of a few syllables ? Besides, what proof have 
these gentlemen that God has been offended? He is 
there in the court-room, fastened to his cross, while 
they sit in their arm-chairs : let them question him ; if 
he answers in the affirmative, I will admit my error. 
Do you know why he tumbled from the throne the 
Capet dynasty, that old and august salad of kings so 
saturated with holy oil? I know, and I am going to 
tell you. It is because it enacted the law against 
sacrilege. 

. But this is not to the point. 

What is it to live ? To rise, to go to bed, to break- 
fast, to dine, and begin again to-morrow. When one 
has performed this task for forty years, it finally be- 
comes very insipid. 

Men resemble the spectators, some sitting on velvet, 
others on bare boards, but the greater number stand- 
ing, who witness the same drama every evening, and 
yawn every one of them till they nearly split their jaws. 
All agree that it is mortally tiresome, that they would 
be much better off in their beds, and yet no one is will- 
ing to give up his place. 

To live, is that worth the trouble of opening one’s 
eyes ? All our enterprises have but a beginning ; the 
house that we build is for our heirs ; the morning 
wrapper that we wad with love to envelop our old age, 
will be made into swaddling-clothes for our grand- 
children. We say to ourselves: “There, the day is 
ended! ” We light our lamp, we stir our fire; we get 


MY UNCLE BENJAIVUN. 


9 


ready to pass a quiet and peaceful evening at the 
corner of our hearth ; tic, tac, some one knocks at the 
door. Who is there? It is death; we must start. 
When we have all the appetites of youtli, when our 
blood is full of iron and alcohol, we are without a cent ; 
when our teeth and stomach are gone, we are million- 
aires. We have scarcely time to say to a woman : “I 
love you ! ” at our second kiss, she is old and decrepit. 
Empires are no sooner consolidated than they begin to 
crumble : they resemble those ant-hills which the poor 
insects build with such great efforts ; when it needs 
but a grain to finish them, an ox crushes them under 
his broad foot, or a cart under its wheel. What you 
call the vegetable stratum of this globe consists of 
thousands and thousands of shrouds laid one upon 
another by successive generations. The great names 
that resound upon the lips of men, names of capitals, 
monarchs, generals, are the clattering debris of old em- 
pires. You do not take a step that you do not raise 
about you the dust of a thousand things destroyed 
before they were finished. 

I am forty years old, I have already passed through 
four professions : I have been a monitor, a soldier, a 
school-teacher, and now I am a journalist. I have been 
on land and on sea, under tents and at the corner of 
the fireside, behind prison bars and in the midst of the 
broad expanses of the world ; I have obeyed and I have 
commanded ; I have had moments of wealth and years 
of poverty. I have been loved and I have been hated; 
I have been applauded and I have been ridiculed. I 
have been a son and a father, a lover and a husband ; I 
have passed through the season of flowers and through 


10 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


the season of fruits, as the poets say ; and under none 
of these circumstances have I found any reason to con- 
gratulate myself on being confined in the skin of a 
man rather than in that of a wolf or a fox, rather than in 
the shell of an oyster, in the bark of a tree, or in the 
jacket of a potato. Perhaps if I were a man of prop- 
erty, a man with an income of fifty thousand francs, I 
should think differently. 

In the meantime, my opinion is that man is a machine 
made expressly for sorrow ; he has only five senses with 
which to receive pleasure, and suffering comes to him 
through the whole surface of his body: in whatever 
spot he is pricked, he bleeds; in whatever spot he is 
burned, he blisters. The lungs, the liver, the bowels 
can give him no enjoyment: nevertheless the lungs 
inflame and make him cough; the liver becomes ob- 
structed and throws him into a fever ; the bowels gripe 
and give him the colic. You have not a nerve, a 
muscle, a sinew under your skin that cannot make you 
howl with pain. 

Your organization unjoints at every moment, like a 
bad pendulum. You raise your eyes to heaven to in- 
voke it, and a swallow’s dung falls into them and dries 
them up ; if you go to a ball, you sprain your ankle and 
have to be carried home on a mattress; to-day you are 
a great writer, a great philosopher, a great poet: a 
fibre of your brain breaks, and in vain will they bleed 
you or put ice on your head, to-morrow you will be 
only a poor madman. 

Sorrow hides behind all your pleasures; you are 
gluttonous rats which it attracts with a bit of savory 
bacon, You are in the shadow of your garden, and 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


11 


you shout : “ Oh ! what a beautiful rose ! ” and the rose 
pricks you ; “ Oh ! what a beautiful fruit I ” there is a 
wasp on it, and the fruit bites you. 

You say: God has made us to serve him and to love 
him. It is not true. He has made you to suffer. The 
man who does not suffer is an ill-made machine, an im- 
perfect creature, a moral cripple, one of nature’s abor- 
tions. Death is not only the end of life, it is its 
remedy. One is nowhere so well off as in the grave. 
If you believe me, you will order, instead of a new 
overcoat, a coffin. It is the only garment that does not 
pinch. 

What I have just said to you you may take for a philo- 
sophical idea or for a paradox, it certainly is all one to 
me. But I pray you at least to accept it as a preface, for 
I cannot make you a better one, or one more suitable to 
the sad and lamentable story which I am going to have 
the honor of relating to you. 

You will perinit me to -trace my story back to the 
second generation, like that of a prince, or of a hero, 
when his funeral oration is delivered. Perhaps you 
will not lose thereby. The customs of that time Were 
well worth those of ours : the people carried swords, 
but they danced with them, and made them rattle 
like castanets. 

For, note this, gayety always keeps company with 
servitude. It is a blessing that God, the great maker 
of compensations, has created especially for those who 
become dependent upon a master, or fall under the 
hard and heavy hand of poverty. This blessing he 
has given them to console them for their miseries, just 
as he has made certain grasses to grow between the 


12 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


pavements that we tread under our feet> certain birds 
to sing on the old'towers, and the beautiful verdure of 
the ivy to smile upon grimacing ruins. 

Gayety flies, like the swallow, above the splendid 
roofs of the greato It stops in the school yards, at the 
gates of barracks, on the mouldy flaggings of prisons. 
It rests like a beautiful butterfly on the pen of the 
school-boy scrawling in his copy-book. It hob-nobs 
at the canteen with the old grenadiers; and never 
does it sing so loud — provided they let it sing — as 
between the dark walls that confine the unfortunate. 

For the rest, the gayety of the poor is a sort of 
pride. I have been poor among the poorest. Well, 
I found pleasure in saying to fortune : I will not bend 
under your hand ; I will eat my hard crust as proudly 
as the dictator Fabricius ate his radishes ; I will 
wear my poverty as kings wear their diadem; strike as 
hard as you like, and strike again : I will answer your 
scourgings with sarcasms ; I will be like the tree that 
blooms while they are cutting at its roots ; like the 
column whose metal eagle shines in the sun while the 
pick is working at its base. 

Dear readers, be content with these explanations, I 
can furnish you none more reasonable. 

What a difference between that age and ours ! The 
man of the constitutional rSgime is not a merry-maker, 
quite the contrary. 

He is hypocritical, avaricious, and profoundly selfish ; 
whatever question strikes against his brow, his brow 
rings like a drawer full of big pennies. 

He is pretentious and swollen with vanity ; the grocer 
calls the confectioner, his neighbor, his honorable friend, 


]\ry UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


13 


and the confectioner begs the grocer to accept the assur- 
ance of the distinguished consideration with which he 
has the honor to be, etc., etc. 

The man of the constitutional regime has a mania 
for wishing to distinguish himself from the people. 
The father wears a blue cotton blouse and the son an 
Elbeuf cloak. To the man of the constitutional regime 
no sacrifice is too costly to satisfy his mania for making 
a show. He lives on bread and water, he dispenses 
with fire in winter and beer in summer, in order to 
wear a coat made of fine cloth, a cashmere waistcoat, 
and yellow gloves. When others regard him as re- 
spectable, he regards himself as great. 

He is prim and stiff ; he does not shout, he does not 
laugh aloud, he knows not where to spit, he never 
makes one gesture more violent than another. He says 
very properly : “ How do you do, Sir ” ; ‘‘ how do you 
do. Madam.” That is good behavior; now, what is 
good behavior? A lying varnish spread upon a bit oi 
wood to make it pass for a cane. We so behave' before 
the ladies. Very well; but, before God, how must we 
behave ? 

He is pedantic, he makes up for the wit that he has 
not by the purism of his language, as a good housewife 
makes up for the furniture winch she lacks by ordei' 
and cleanliness. 

He is always observant of the proprieties. If he 
attends a banquet, he is silent and preoccupied, he 
swallows a cork for a piece of bread, and uses the cream 
for the melted butter. He waits till a toast is proposed 
before he drinks. He always has a newspaper in his 
pockets, he talks only of commercial treaties and rail- 


14 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


way lines, and laughs only in the Chamber of Dep- 
uties. 

l^ut, at the period to which I take you back, the cus- 
toms of the little towns were not yet glossed with 
elegance; they were full of charmhig negligence and 
mcst agreeable simplicity. The characteristic of that 
haj^py age was unconcern. All these men, ships or 
walnut-shells, abandoned themselves with closed eyes 
to the current of life, without troubling themselves as 
to where it would land them. 

The bourgeois were not office-seekers; they were not 
miserly ; they lived at home in joyous abundance, and 
speiit their incomes to the last louis. The merchants, 
few in number then, grew rich slowly, without devot- 
ing themselves exclusively to business, and solely by 
the force of things; the laborers worked, not to amass 
savings, but to make both ends meet. They had not at 
their heels that terrible competition which presses us, 
and cries to us incessantly : “ On ! On ! ” Conse- 

quently they took their ease ; they had supported their 
fathers, and, when they were old, their children in turn 
would support them. 

Such was the abandonment of this society to merry- 
maldng that all the lawyers and even the judges went 
to the wine-shop, and there publicly took part in orgies. 
Far from fearing lest this might be known, they would 
willingly have hung their wigs upon the branches of 
the tavern bush. All these people, great and small 
alike, seemed to have no other business than to amuse 
themselves; they exercised their ingenuity ^only in 
playing some joke or in concocting some good story. 
Those who then had wit, instead of expending it in 
intrigues, expended it in merriment. 


^lY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


15 


The idlers, and there were many of them, gathered 
in the public square ; to them, market-days were days 
of fun. The peasants who came to bring their pro- 
visions to the town were their martyrs ; they practised 
on them the most waggish and witty cruelties ; all the 
neighbors hurried to get their share of the show. The 
police magistrates of to-day would prosecute • such 
things; but the court officials of that time enjoyed 
these burlesque scenes as well as anybody, and often 
took part in them. 

My grandfather was a summons-server; my grand- 
mother was a little woman whom they reproached with 
not being able to see, when she went to church, whether 
the holy- water basin was full. She has remained in my 
memory like a little girl of sixty. When she had been 
-married six years, she had five children, some boys and 
some girls ; they all lived upon my grandfiither’s miser- 
able fees, and got along marvellously well. The seven 
of them dined off three herrings, but they had plenty 
of bread and wine, for my grandfather had a vineyard 
which was an inexhaustible source of white wine. All^ 
these children were utilized by my grandmother, ac- 
cording to their age and strength. The eldest, who 
was my father, was named Gaspard ; he washed the 
dishes and went to the butcher’s shop, there was no 
poodle in the town better tamed than he ; the second 
swept the room ; the third held the fourth in his arms, 
and the fifth rocked in its cradle. Meantime my grand- 
mother was at church or talking wfith her neighbors. 
All went well, however; they succeeded in reaching 
the end of the year without getting into debt. The 
boys were strong, the girls were not ill, and the father 
and mother were happy. 


16 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


My uncle Benjamin lived at his sister’s ; he was five 
feet ten inches in height, carried a big sword at his 
side, and wore a coat of scarlet ratteen, breeches of the 
same color and material, pearl-gray silk stockings, and 
shoes with silver buckles ; over his coat bobbed a large 
black cue almost as long as his sword, which, inces- 
santly going and coming, had covered him with pow- 
der, so that my uncle’s coat, with its shades of red and 
white, looked like a peeling brick. My uncle was a 
doctor ; that was why he had a sword. I do not know 
whether the sick had much confidence in him ; but he, 
Benjamin, had very little confidence in medicine : he 
often said that a doctor.-did very well if he did not kill 
his patient. Whenever my uncle Benjamin came into 
possession of a franc or two, he went to buy a big fish 
and gave it to his sister to make a matelote, upon 
which the entire family feasted. My uncle Benjamin, 
according to all who knew him, was the gayest, droll- 
est, wittiest man in all the country round, and he would 
have been the most — how shall I say it not to fail in 
respect to my great uncle’s memory ? — he would have 
been the least sober, if the town drummer, named 
Cicero, had not shared his glory. 

Nevertheless my uncle Benjamin was not what you 
lightly term a drunkard, make no mistake about that. 
He was an epicurean who pushed philosophy to the 
point of intoxication, — that was all. He had a very 
elevated and distinguished stomach. He loved wine, 
not for itself, but for that short-lived madness which it 
brings, a madness which engenders in the man of wit 
an unreasonableness so naive, piquant, and original that 
one almost prefers it to reason. If he could have in- 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


17 


toxicated himself by reading the mass, he would have 
read the mass every day. My uncle Benjamin had 
principles : he maintained that a fasting man was a 
man still asleep ; that intoxication would have been 
one of the greatest blessings of the Creator, if it had 
not injured the head, and tliat the only thing that 
made man superior to the brute was the faculty of 
getting drunk. 

Reason, said my uncle, amounts to nothing; it is 
simply the power of feeling present evils and remem- 
bering them. The privilege of abdicating one’s reason 
is the only thing of value. You say that the man who 
drowns his reason in wine brutalizes himself: it is the 
pride of caste that makes you hold to that opinion. 
Do you really think, then, that the condition of the 
brute is worse than your own? When you are tor- 
mented by hunger, you would like very* much to be 
the ox that feeds in grass up to his belly ; when you 
are in prison, you would like very much to be the bird 
that cleaves the azure of the skies with a free wing ; 
when you are on the point of being turned out of house 
and home, you would like very much to be the ugly 
snail whose shell there is none to dispute. 

The equality of which you dream, the brute pos- 
sesses. In the forests , there are neither kings, nor 
nobles, nor a third estate. The problem of common 
life studied in vain by your philosophers was solved 
thousands of centuries ago by the poor insects, the ants, 
and the bees. The animals have no doctors ; they are 
neither blind, nor hump-backed, nor lame, nor bow- 
legged, and they have no fear of hell. 

My uncle Benjamin was twenty-eight years old. He 


18 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


had been practising medicine for three years ; but medi- 
cine had not made him a man of income, far from it : 
he owed his tailor for three scarlet coats and his barber 
for three years of hair-dressing, and in each of the most 
famous taverns of the town he had a pretty little 
account running, with nothing on the credit side but 
a few drugs. 

My grandmother was three years older than Benja- 
min; she had cradled him on her knees and carried 
him in her arms, and she looked upon herself as his 
mentor. She bought his cravats and pocket-handker- 
chiefs, mended his shirts, and gave him good advice, to 
which he listened very attentively, — so much justice at 
least must be done him, — but of which he did not make 
the slightest use. 

Every evening regularly, after supper, she urged him 
to seek a wife. 

“ Bah ! ” said Benjamin ; “ to have six children like 
Machecourt,” — that was the name he gave my grand- 
father, — “ and dine off the fins of a herring ? ” 

“ But, poor fellow, you would at least have bread.” 

“Yes, bread that will have risen too much to-day, 
not enough to-morrow, and the day after will have the 
measles ! Bread ! what does that amount to ? It is 
good to keep one from dying, but it is not good to 
make one live. I shall be far advanced indeed when 
I shall have a wife to tell me that I put too much sugar 
in my vials and too much powder on my cue, to come 
to the tavern in search of me, to rummage in my 
pockets when I am asleep, and to buy three cloaks for 
herself to one coat for me.” 

“But your creditors, Benjamin, how do you expect 
to pay them 2 ’■ 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


19 


“ In the first place, when one has credit, it is the 
same as if he were rich, and when your creditors are 
good-natured and patient, it is the same as if you had 
none. Besides, what do I need to enable me to square 
my accounts? Only a first-class epidemic. God is 
good, my dear sister, and will not abandon in his em- 
barrassment him whose business it is to repair his 
finest work.” 

“Yes,” said my grandfather, “and render it so un- 
serviceable that it has to be buried in the ground.” 

“ Well,” responded my uncle, “that is the usefulness 
of doctors; but for them there w6uld be too many 
people in the world. Of what use would it be for God 
to take the trouble to send us diseases if men could be 
found to cure them ? ” 

“ In that case you are a ' dishonest man you rob 
those who send for you.” 

“No, I do not rob them, because I reassure them, I 
gh-e them hope, and I always find a way to make them 
laugh. That is worth a good deal.” 

My grandmother, seeing that the conversation had 
changed its current, decided that she had better go to 
sleep. 


CHAPTER IT. 

WHY MY UNCLE DECIDED TO MARRY. 

Nevertheless a terrible catastrophe, which I shall 
have the honor to relate to you directly, shook Benja- 
min’s resolutions. 

One day my cousin Page, a lawyer in the bailiwick 
of Clamecy, came to invite him together with Mache- 
court to celebrate Saint Yves. The dinner was to take 
place at a well-known tea-garden situated within two 
gun-shots of the faubourg ; the guests, moreover, were 
a select party. Benjamin would not have given that 
evening for an entire week of his ordinary life. So 
after vespers my grandfather, adorned in his wedding 
coat, and my uncle, with his sword at his side, were at 
the rendezvous. 

Almost all the guests were there. Saint Yves was 
magnificently represented in this assembly. In the 
first place there was Page, the lawyer, who never 
pleaded a case except between two glasses of wine ; the 
clerk of the court, who was in the habit of writing 
while asleep ; the government attcnmey, Rapin, who, 
having received as a present from a litigant a cask of 
tart wine, had him cited before the court that he might 
get a better one from him ; Arthus, the notary, who 
had been known to eat a whole salmon for his dessert; 
Millot-Rataut, poet and tailor, author of “ Grand 
Noel”; an old architect that had not been sober for 
twenty years; M. Minxit, a doctor of the neighbor- 


MY TJKCLE BEKJAMIK. 21 

hood, who consulted urines ; two or three notable mer- 
chants, — notable, that is, for their gayety and appe- 
tite ; and some huntsmen, who had provided the table 
with an abundance of game. At sight of Benjamin all 
the guests uttered a shout of welcome, and declared that 
it was time to sit down to table. During the two first 
courses all went well. My uncle was charming with 
his wit and his sallies ; but at dessert heads began to 
grow hot ; all commenced shouting at once. Soon the 
conversation was nothing but a confusion of epigrams, 
oaths, and sallies, bursting out together and trying to 
stifle each other, the whole making a noise like that of 
a dozen glasses clashing' against each other simulta- 
neously. 

“ Gentlemen,” cried Page, the lawyer, “ I must en- 
tertain you with my last speech in court. The case 
was this. Two asses had got into a quarrel in a 
meadow. The owner of one, good-for-nothing scamp 
that he is, runs and beats the other ass. But this 
quadruped, not being disposed to endure it, bites our 
man on the little finger. The owner of the ass who 
inflicted the bite is cited before the bailiff as responsible 
for the doings of his beast. I was counsel for the 
defendant. ‘Before coming to the question of fact,’ 
said I to the bailiff, ‘ I must enlighten you as to. the 
morals of the ass that I defend and that of the plaintiff. 
Our ass is an entirely inoffensive quadruped; he enjoys 
the esteem of all who know him, and the town con- 
stable holds him in high regard. Now, I defy the man 
who is our adversary to say as much of his. Our 
ass is the bearer of a certificate from the mayor of his 
commune, — and this certificate really existed, — which 


22 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


testifies to his morality and good conduct. If the 
plaintiff can produce a like certificate, we consent to 
pay him three thousand francs damages.’ ” 

“ May Saint Yves bless you ! ” said my uncle ; “ now 
the poet, Millot-Rataut, must sing us his ‘Grand 
Noel’: 

‘ A genoux, chretieiis, k genoux ! ’ 

“ That is eminently lyrical. It must have been the 
Holy Spirit that inspired that beautiful line.” 

“I should like to see you do as much,” cried the 
tailor, who was very irascible under t^e influence of 
Burgundy. 

“ I am not so stupid,” answered my uncle. 

“ Silence 1 ” interrupted Page, the lawyer, striking 
with all his might on the table ; “I declare to the court 
that I wish to finish my plea.” 

“ Directly,” said my uncle ; “ you are not yet drunk 
enough to plead.” 

“And I tell you that I will plead now. Who are 
you, old five-foot-ten, to prevent a lawyer from talk- 
ing ? ” 

“ Have a care. Page,” exclaimed Arthus, the notary, 
“you are only a man of the pen, and you are dealing 
with a man of the sword.” 

‘Ht well becomes you, a man of the fork, and a 
devourer of salmon, to talk of men of the sword; 
before you could frighten anybody, he would have to 
be cooked.” 

“Benjamin is indeed terrible,” said the architect. 
“ He is like the lion ; at one stroke of his cue he can 
knock a man down.” 


]MY UKCLE BEKJAMIK. 


23 


‘‘Gentlemen,” said my grandfather, rising, “I will 
answer for my brother-in-law ; he has never shed blood 
except with his lancet.” 

“ Do you really dare to maintain that, Machecourt ? ” 

“ And you, Benjamin, do you really dare to maintain 
the contrary?” 

“ Then you shall give me satisfaction on the instant 
for this insult ; and, as we have here but one sword, 
which is mine, I will keep the scabbard, and you shall 
take the blade.” 

My grandfather, who was very fond of his brother-in- 
law, accepted the proposition, to avoid vexing him. As 
the two adversaries rose. Page, the lawyer, said : 

“ One moment, gentlemen. We must fix the condi- 
tions of the combat. I propose that each of the two 
adversaries shall hold on to the arm of his second, in 
order that he may not fall before it is time.” 

“ Adopted ! ” cried all the gufests. 

Benjamin and Machecourt stood promptly face to 
face. 

“Are you there, Benjamin?” 

“ And you, Machecourt ? ” 

With the first stroke of his sword my grandfather 
cut Benjamin’s scabbard in two as if it had been an 
oyster plant, and made a gasli upon his wrist sufficient 
to force him to drink with his left hand for at least a 
week. 

“ Tlie clumsy fellow ! ” cried Benjamin ; “ he has cut 
me.” 

“ What !” answered my grandfather, with charming 
simplicity, “does your sword really cut?” 

“All the same, 1 still want my revenge; and the 


24 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIK. 


remaining half of this scabbard is enough with which 
to make you beg my pardon.” 

“No, Benjamin,” rejoined my grandfather, “it is 
your turn to take the sword. If you stick me, we shall 
be even, and we will play no more.” 

The guests, sobered by this accident, wanted to re- 
turn to town. 

“No, gentlemen,” cried Benjamin, with his stento- 
rian voice, “let each one return to his seat; I have a 
proposition to make to you. Considering that it was 
his first attempt, Machecourt has behaved most brill- 
iantly ; he is in a position to measure himself against 
the most murderous of barbers, provided the latter will 
yield him the sword and keep the scabbard. I propose 
that we name him fencing-master ; only on this condi- 
tion will I consent to let him live ; and, if you indorse 
my opinion, I will even force myself to offer him my 
left hand, inasmuch as he has disabled the other.” 

“Benjamin is right,” cried a multitude of voices. 
“ Bravo, Benjamin. Machecourt must be made fencing- 
master.” 

And each one ran to his seat, and Benjamin ordered 
a second dessert. 

'Meanwhile the news of this accident had spread to 
Clamecy. In passing from mouth to mouth, it had 
grown marvellously, and, when it reached my grand- 
mother, it had taken on the gigantic proportions of a 
murder committed by her husband upon the person of 
her brother. 

My grandmother, in a body that was less than five 
feet long, liad a character that was full of firmness and 
energy. She did not go screaming and crying to her 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


25 


neighbors, to have them apply salts to her nose. With 
that presence of mind which sorrow imparts to strong 
souls, she saw at once what she must do. She put her 
children to bed, took all the money there was in the 
house, and the few jewels that she possessed, in order 
to supply her husband with means to leave the country, 
if that should be necessary; made up a-bundle of linen 
for bandages and of lint to stanch the wounds of the 
injured man in case he should be still alive; took a 
mattress from her bed, and asked a neighbor to follow 
on with it; and then,- wrapping herself in her cloak, she 
started without faltering for the fatal tea-garden. On 
entering the faubourg, she met her husband, whom 
they were bringing back in triumph, crowned with 
corks. Benjamin, on whose left arm he was supported, 
was crying at the top of his voice : “ Know all men by 
these presents, that Monsieur Machecourt, verger to 
his Majesty, has just been appointed fencing-master, in 
reward ”... 

“Dog of a drunkard!” cried my grandmother, on 
seeing Benjamin; and, unable to resist the emotion 
that had been stifling her for an hour, she fell upon 
the pavement. They had to carry her home on the 
mattress which she had intended for her brother. 

As for the latter, he remembered his wound only 
the next morning when he was putting on his coat; 
but his sister had a high fever. She was dangerously 
ill for a week, and during the entire time Benjamin 
did not leave her bedside. When at last she could 
listen to him, he promised her that henceforth he would 
lead a more regular life, and said that he was seriously 
thinking of paying his debts and marrying. 


26 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


My grandmother soon recovered. She charged her 
husband to be on the lookout for a^wife for Ben- 
jamin. 

Sometime after that, one evening in November, my 
grandfather came home, splashed to the chin, but 
radiant. 

' “I have found something far better than we ex- 
pected,” cried the excellent man, pressing the hand 
of his brother-in-law; ‘‘now, Benjamin, you are rich; 
you can eat as many matelotes as you like.” 

“But what have you found, then?” asked my 
grandmother and Benjamin at the same time. 

“An only daughter, a rich heiress, the daughter of 
Minxit, with whom we celebrated Saint Yves a month 
ago.” 

“ What, that village doctor who consults urines ? ” 

“Precisely; he accepts you unreservedly; he is 
charmed with your wit; he believes that you are well 
fitted, by your manners and your eloquence, to aid him 
in his industry.” 

“ The devil ! ” said Benjamin, scratching his head, 
“ I am not anxious to consult urines.” 

“ Oh, you big booby ! Once you are father Minxit’s 
son-in-law, you can dismiss him and his vials, and bring 
your wife to Clamecy.” 

“ Yes, but Mile. Minxit has red hair.” 

“ She is only blonde, Benjamin ; I give you my word 
of honor.” 

“ She is so freckled that one would say a handful of 
bran had been thrown in her face.” 

“I saw her this evening. I assure you that she is 
scarcely freckled at all.” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


27 


“ Besides, she is five feet three iuclies tall. I really 
should be afraid of spoiling the human race. We should 
have children as tall as bean-poles.” 

“ Oh, these are only stupid jokes,” said my grand- 
mother; “I met your tailor yesterday, and he abso- 
lutely insists on being paid ; and you know very well 
that your barber will not dress your hair again.” 

“So you wish me, my dear sister, to marry Mile. 
Minxit? But you do not know what that means, 
Minxit, And you, Machecourt, do you know?” 

“ To be sure I know ; it means father Minxit.” 

“Have you read Horace. Machecourt?” 

“ No, Benjamin.” 

“Well, Horace says: Num minxit patrios cineres. 
It is that devil of a preterit at which I rebel ; besides, 
my dear sister is no longer sick. M. Minxit, Mme. 
Minxit, M. Rath’ery Benjamin Minxit, little Jean Rath- 
ery Minxit, little Pierre Rathery Minxit, little Adele 
Rathery Minxit. Why, in our family there will be 
enough to turn a mill. And then, to be frank about 
it, I am scarcely anxious to marry. You know there 
is a song that says: 

. . . ‘ qu’on est heureux 
Dans les liens du mariage ! ’ 

But this song does not know what it sings. It must 
have been written by a bachelor. 

. . . ‘ qu’on est heureux 
Dans les liens du mariage ! ’ 

That would be all right, Machecourt, if a man were free 
to choose a companion for liimself ; but the necessities 
of social life always force us to marry in a ridiculous 


28 


]SiY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


way and contrary to our inclinations. Man marries a 
dowry, woman a profession. Then, after all the fine 
Sundays of their honeymoon, they return to the solitude 
of their household, only to see that they do not suit 
each other. One is avaricious and the other prodigal, 
the wife is coquettish and the husband jealous, one 
likes the north wind and the other the south wind ; 
they would like to be a thousand miles apart, but they 
have to live in the circle of iron within which they have 
confined themselves, and remain together usque ad vitam 
oiternamy 

“ Is he drunk ? ’’ whispered my grandfather to' his 
wife. 

“ What makes you think so ? ” answered the latter. 

“ Because he is talking sense.” 

Nevertheless they made my uncle listen to reason, 
and it was agreed that on the next day, which was Sun- 
day, he should go to see Mile. Minxit. 


CHAPTER III. 

HOW MY UNCLE MEETS AN OLD SERGEANT AND A POODLE 
DOG, WHICH PREVENTS HIM FROM GOING TO 
M. MINXIT’s. 

The next day, at eight o’clock in the morning, my 
uncle was dressed in clean linen, and needed in order 
to start only a pair of shoes which were to be brought 
him by Cicero, the famous town-crier of whom we have 
already spoken, and who combined the profession of 
shoemaker with that of drummer. 

Cicero was not slow in arriving. In those days of 
frankness it was the custom, when a workman brought 
work to a house, not to let him go away without first 
making him drink several glasses of wine. It was a 
bad habit, I admit ; but these kindly ways tended to 
offset class distinctions ; the poor man was grateful to 
the rich man for his concessions, and was not jealous of 
him. Consequently during the Revolution there was 
seen an admirable devotion of servants to their masters, 
of farmers to their landlords, of laborers to their em- 
ployers, which certainly could not be found in the pres- 
ent day of insolent arrogance and ridiculous pride. 

Benjamin asked his sister to go and draw a bottle of 
white wine, that he might drink with Cicero. His sister 
drew one, then two, then three, and even seven. 

“ My dear sister, I beg of you, one more bottle.” 

“ But do you not know, you wretch, that you are at 
the eighth ? ” 


3 


80 


MY FNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ You know very well, dear sister, that we keep no 
accounts together.” 

“ But you know very well that you have a journey 
to make.” 

“ Just this last bottle, and I start.” 

“Yes, you are in a fine condition to start ! Suppose 
anyone should send for you now to visit a patient ? ” 

“ How little you appreciate, my good sister, the ef- 
fects of wine ! It is easy to see that you drink only 
the limpidi waters of the Beuvron. Have I to start? 
My centre of gravity is always in the same place. 
Have I to bleed some one. . . . But, by the way, my 
sister, I must bleed you ; Machecourt advised it when 
he went out. You were complaining this morning of a 
severe headache ; a bleeding will do you good.” 

And Benjamin took out his case of instruments, and 
my grandmother armed herself with the ttongs. 

“The devil! You make a very rebellious patient. 
Well, let us compromise; I will not bleed you, and you 
shall go to draw us an eighth bottle of wine.” 

“ I will not draw you a single glass.” 

“ Then I will draw it myself,” said Benjamin ; and, 
taking the^,bottle, he started for the cellar. 

My grandmother, seeing no better way of stopping 
him, seized his cue ; but Benjamin, without paying any 
attention to this incident, went to the cellar with a 
step as firm as if there had been only a bunch of onions 
Imnging to his cue, and came back with his bottle full. 

“Well, my dear sister, it was well worth while for 
two of us to go to the cellar for a paltry bottle of white 
wine ; but I must warn you that, if you persist in tliese 
bad habits, you will force me to cut off my cue,” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


31 


Nevertheless Benjamin, who but a short time before 
had looked upon the journey to Corvol as a disagree- 
able duty, was now obstinately bent on starting. My 
grandmother, to make it impossible for him to do so, 
had locked up his shoes in the closet. 

“ I tell you that I will go.” 

“ And I tell you that you shall not go.” 

“ Do you wish me to carry you clear to M. Minxit’s 
hanging to the end of my cue ? ” 

Such was the dialogue in progress betvceen brother 
and sister when my grandfather arrived. He put an 
end to the discussion by declaring that the next day 
he must go to La Chapelle, and that he would take 
Benjamin with him. 

My grandfather was up before daylight. When he 
had scribbled off his writ and written at the foot: 
“ The cost of which is six francs four sous and six 
deniers,” he wiped his pen on the sleeve of his coat, 
carefully put away his glasses in their nase, and went 
to wake Benjamin. The latter was sleeping like the 
Prince de Conde (provided the Prince was not pretend- 
ing sleep) on the eve of a battle. 

“ Hello, there, Benjamin, get up ; it is broad day- 
light.” 

“ You are mistaken,” answered Benjamin, with a 
grunt, and turning over toward the wall, “ it is pitch 
dark.” 

“Lift up your head, and you will see the sunlight on 
the floor.” 

“ I tell you that it is the light of the street lamp.” 

“ Oh, then, you do not want to go? ” 

“No; I have dreamed all night of hard bread and 


32 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


sour wine, and if we start some misfortune will happen 
to us.” 

“ Well, I declare to you that, if in ten minutes you 
are not up, I will send your de^ sister to you. If, on 
the other hand, you are up, I will open that quarter- 
cask of old wine you know so well.” 

“You are sure that it is from Pouilly, are you?” 
said Benjamin, sitting up in bed ; “ you give me your 
word of honor? ” 

“ Yes, upon my word as a summons-server.” 

“ Then go open your quarter-cask ; but I warn you 
that, if we meet with any accident on our way, you will - 
have to answer for it to my dear sister.” 

An hour later my uncle and my grandfather were 
on their way to Moulot. At some distance from the 
town they met two little peasants, of whom one was . 
carrying a rabbit under his arm and the other had two 
hens in his basket. The former said to his com- 
panion : 

“ If you will tell M. Cliquet that my rabbit is a 
warren rabbit, and that you saw him taken in the trap, 
you shall be my comrade.” 

“Willingly,” answered the latter, “but on condition 
that you will tell Mine. Deby that my hens lay twice 
a day and that their eggs are as big as ducks’ eggs.” 

“You are* two little thieves,” said my grandfather; 

“ I will have your ears pulled one of these days by the 
commissary of police.” 

“ And I, my friends,” said Benjamin, “ I beg you each 
to accejit this twelve-clenier piece.” 

“ Well, that’s generosity well placed,” said my grand- 
father, shrugging his shoulders ; “ you will undoubtedly 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


give the flat of yonr sword to the first poor honest man 
that you meet, since you prostitute your money on 
these two scamps.” 

“ Scamps to you, Machecourt, who see only the sur- 
face of things ; but to me they are two philosophers. 
They have just invented a machine which, well organ- 
ized, would make' the fortune of ten honest people.” 

“ And what machine is that, pray,” said my grand- 
father, with an air of incredulity, “ which has just been 
invented by these two philosophers, whom I would 
thrash soundly if we had the time to stop?” 

“ It is a simple machine,” said my uncle ; “ this is 
how it works. We are ten friends who, instead of 
meeting for breakfast, meet to make our fortunes.” 

“ That is something worth meeting for,” interrupted 
my grandfather. 

“ All ten of us are intelligent, adroit, and, if need 
be, shrewd. We have loud voices and are wonderful 
debaters. We handle words with the same skill with 
which a juggler handles his balls. As for morality, we 
are all capable in our professions, and well-meaning 
persons may say, without seriously compromising them- 
selves, that we are superior to our rivals. We form, 
with the most honorable intentions, a society to puff 
each other, to inflate our little merits and make them 
froth and foam.” 

“I understand,” said my grandfather; “one sells 
‘Rough on Rats’ and has only a big drum, the other 
Swiss tea and has only a pair of cymbals. You unite 
your means of making a noise, and ”... 

“That’s it exactly,” interrupted Benjamin. “You 
see that, if the machine works properly, each of the 


84 


MY UNCLI5 BENJAMIN. 


members has about him nine instruments that make a 
frightful uproar. 

“There are nine of us who say: Page, the lawyer, 
drinks too much ; but I believe that this devil of a man 
steeps leaves from the common-law book in his wine, 
and that he has bottled up logic. All the cases that he 
wants to win, he wins ; and the other day he got a ver- 
dict of heavy damages for a geaitleman who had beaten 
a peasant. 

“ The process-server, Parian ta, is a little crafty ; but 
he is the Hannibal of process-servers. His arrests for 
debt are inevitable ; his debtor could only escape him if 
he had no body at all. He would lay his hand on the 
shoulder of a duke and peer. 

“ As for Benjamin Rathery, he is a careless fellow, 
who mocks at everything and laughs in the face of 
fever, a man, if you will, of the plate and the bottle ; 
but it is precisely for that reason that I prefer him to 
his rivals. He has not the air of those sinister doctors 
whose register is a cemetery. He is too gay and di- 
gests too well to have many death certificates to answer 
for. 

“ Thus each of the members finds himself multiplied 
by nine.” 

“ Yes,” said my grandfather, “ but will that give you 
nine red coats? Nine times Benjamin Rathery, what 
does thift make?” 

“ That makes nine hundred times Machecourt,” re- 
plied Benjamin, quickly. “But let me finish my 
demonstration; you shall joke afterward. 

“ Here are nine living advertisements, who insinuate 
themselves everywhere, who repeat to you to-morrow 


I^IY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


35 


under another form what they have told you to-day ; 
nine placards that talk and take passers-by by the arm ; 
nine signs that promenade through the town, that dis- 
cuss, that make dilemmas and enthymemes, and mock at 
you if you are not of their opinion. 

“ As a result, the reputation of Page, Rapin, and 
Rathery, which was dragging painfully along withm 
the precincts of their little town, like a lawyer in a 
vicious circle, suddenly takes an astonishing flight. 
Yesterday it had no feet; to-day it has wings. It ex- 
pands like gas when the bottle in which it was conflned 
has been opened. It spreads throughout the province. 
Clients come to these people from all parts of the baili- 
wick ; tliey come from the South and from the North, 
from the dawn and from the sunset, as in the Apoca- 
lypse the elect come to the city of Jerusalem. After 
five or six years Benjamin Rathery is the owner of a 
handsome fortune, which he expends, with great noise 
of glasses and bottles, in breakfasts and dinners ; you, 
Machecourt, are no longer a server of writs ; I buy you 
the office of bailiff. Your wife is covered with silks 
and laces like a holy queen; your eldest son, who is 
already a choir-boy, enters the ecclesiastical seminary ; 
your second son, who is sickly and as yellow as a canary 
bird, studies medicine ; I give him my reputation and 
my old clients, and I keep him in red coats. Of your 
youngest sOn, we make a lawyer. Your eldest daughter 
marries a man of letters. We marry the youngest to a 
fat bourgeois^ and the day after the wedding we put the 
machine away in the attic.” 

“ Yes, but your machine has one little defect ; it is 
not for the use of honest people.” 


36 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“Why SO?” 

“ Because.” 

“ Because what ? ” 

“ Because the effect is immoral.” 

“ Can you prove me that hy now and by tlienV'' 

“ To the devil with your now% and them. You are 
an educated man, and you reason with your mind ; but 
I, who am a poor server of writs, I feel with my con- 
science. I maintain that any man who acquires his 
fortune by other means than his labor and his talents 
is not a legitimate possessor.” 

“What you say is very good, Machecourt,” cried my 
uncle; “you are perfectly right. Conscience is the 
best of all logics, and charlatanism, under whatever 
form it ma}^ disguise itself, is always a swindle. Well, 
we will break our machine and say no more about it.” 

While chattering tlius, they were approaching the 
village of i\Ioulot ; they saw in front of a vineyard gate 
a sort of soldier half buried in brambles, the brown and 
red tufts of which, touched by the frost, fell in con- 
fusion like a disordered head of hair. This man had 
on his head a piece of a cocked hat without a cockade ; 
his dilapidated face had a stony tint, that yellow tint 
which old monuments have in the sunlight. The two 
halves of a huge white moustache encircled his mouth, 
like two parentheses. He was dressed in an old uni- 
form. Across one of the sleeves stretched an old and 
worn strip of gold lace. 

The other sleeve, deprived of its ensign, was nothing 
but a rectangle distinguished from the rest of the mate- 
rial by a newer wool and a deeper shade. His bare 
legs, swollen by the cold, were red as beets. He was 


MY trXCLE BE^fJAMIN. 


BT 


letting a few drops of brandy drip from a gourd on 
some old pieces of black bread. A poodle dog of the 
larger type was sitting in front of him, and following 
all his movements, like a dumb servant listening with 
his eyes to the orders given him by his master. 

My uncle would sooner have passed by a tavern 
without stopping than by this man. Halting on the 
side of the road, he said : 

“ Comrade, that’s a bad breakfast you have there.” 

“I have eaten many a worse one, but Fontenoy and 
I have good appetites.” 

“ Who is Fontenoy ? ” 

“ My dog, that poodle that you see there.” 

“ The devil ! but that is a fine name for a dog. But 
then, glory is a good thing for kings ; why shouldn’t it 
be for poodle dogs? ” 

“ That’s his fighting name,-” continued the sergeant ; 
“ his family name is Azor.” 

“ Well, why do you call him Fontenoy ?” 

“ Because at the battle of Fontenoy he made an Eng- 
lish captain prisoner.” 

“Hey, how is that?” exclaimed my uncle, greatly 
astonished. 

“ In a very simple way, by hanging to one of the 
skirts of his coat until I could lay my hand on his 
shoulder. Fontenoy, just as he is, has been made a 
member of the order of the army, and has had the 
honor to be presented to Louis XV., who condescended 
to say to me: ‘Sergeant Duranton, you have a fine 
dog . there.’ ” 

“Well, that was a king who was very sociable with 
quadrupeds : I am astonished that he did not issue a 


88 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


patent of nobility to your poodle. How does it happen 
that you have abandoned the service of so good a 
king ? ” 

“ Because they have done me a wrong,” said the ser- 
geant, his eyes glaring and his nostrils swelling with 
anger ; “ I have had ;these golden rags on my arms for 
ten years ; I have been through all the campaigns of 
Maurice de Saxe, and I have more scars on my body 
than would be required for two periods of service. 
They had promised me the epaulette; but to make a 
weaver’s son an officer would have been a scandal 
calculated to horrify all the pigeon wings of France and 
of Navarre. They promoted over my body a sort of 
little knight just hatched from his page’s shell. He 
will find a way to get himself killed, of course; for 
they are brave, there is no denying that. But he does 
not know how to say : ‘ Eyes, . . . right 1 ’ ” 

At this drill command, strongly accented by the ser- 
geant, the poodle turned his eyes to the right in a truly 
military fashion. 

“Very fine, Fontenoy,” said his master, “you forget 
that we have retired from the service.” And he con- 
tinued : “ I could not forgive the very Christian king 
for that; I have been out with him ever since, and 
I asked him for my furlough, which he graciously 
granted.” 

“You have done well, brave man,” cri6d Benjamin, 
slapping the old soldier on the shoulder, an imprudent 
gesture that came very near causing the poodle to de- 
vour him. “ If my approval is of any value to you, I 
give it to you without reserve ; the nobles have never 
stood in the way of my advancement, but that does not 
prevent me from hating them with all my heart.” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


39 


“ In that case it is a purely platonic hatred,” inter- 
rupted my grandfather. 

‘‘Say rather a purely philosophical hatred, Mache- 
court. Nobility is the most absurd of all things. It is 
a flagrant revolt of despotism against the Creator. Did 
God make the grasses of the prairie higher one than 
the other? Did he engrave escutcheons upon the 
wings of birds and the skins of wild beasts? What 
signify these superior men which a king makes by let- 
ters patent, as he makes an exciseman or a liuckster ? 
Dating from to-day, you will recognize Mr. So-and-so 
as a superior man. Signed Louis XVI., and lower 
down Choiseul. Oh, that’s a fine way to establish supe- 
riority. 

“A villein is made a count by Henri IV., because he 
has served that majesty with a nice goose ; if he had 
served a capon with the goose, he would have been 
made a marquis ; it would have taken no more ink or 
parchment. Now the descendants of these men have 
the privilege of beating us, whose ancestors never had 
an opportunity of offering a fowl’s wing to a king. 

“And see on what a little thing greatness depends in 
this world ! If the goose had been cooked a little more 
or a little less, if they had put on it one more pinch of 
salt or one less pinch of pepper, if a little soot had 
fallen into the dripping-pan or a little cinder upon the 
slices of bread, or if the bird had been served a little 
sooner or a little later, there would have been one less 
noble family in France. And the people bow their 
heads before such greatness ! Oh ! I could wish, as 
Caligula wished of the Roman people, that France had 
but a single pair of cheeks that I might slap its face. 


40 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


But tell me, imbecile people, what value do you 
find then in the two letters that these people place be- 
fore their names ? Do they add an inch to their stat- 
ure? Have they more iron than you in their blood, 
more cerebral marrow in the bony box of their heads ? 
Could they handle a sword heavier than yours? Does 
this marvellous de cure scrofula ? Does it preserve its 
possessor from the colic when he has dined too heavily, 
or from intoxication when he has drunk too much? 
Do you not see that all these counts, these barons, these 
marquises, are capital letters which, in spite of the place 
that they occupy in the line, are never of more impor- 
tance than the small letters ? If a duke and peer and 
a woodcutter were together on an American prairie or 
in the middle of the great desert of Sahara, I should 
like to know which of the two would be the nobler. 

“Their great-great-grandfather wielded the shield, 
and your father made cotton caps; what does that 
prove for them or against you? Do they come into 
the world with their ancestor’s shield at their side? 
Have they his scars marked on their skin ? What is 
this greatness that is transmitted from father to son, 
like a new candle which we light from a candle that is 
going out? Are the toadstools which arise from the 
ruins of a dead oak, oaks on that account ? 

“When I learn that the king has created a noble 
family, it seems to me that I see a farmer planting in his 
field a big booby of a poppy, which will infect twenty 
furrows with its seed and yield every year only four 
big red leaves. Nevertheless, as long as there shall be 
kings, there will be nobles. 

“ The kings make counts, marquises, dukes, that ad- 


UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


41 


miration may rise to them by degrees. Nobles, rela- 
tively to them, are the bagatelles of the gate, the pa- 
rade that gives the idlers a foretaste of the magnificence 
of the spectacle. A king without nobility would be a 
salon without an ante-chamber; but this dainty pride 
will cost them dear. It is impossible that twenty mill- 
ions of men should consent forever to be nothing in 
the State that a few thousand courtiers may be some- 
thing ; who sows privileges will reap revolutions. 

“ The time is not far off perhaps when all these 
brilliant escutcheons will be dragged in the gutter, and 
when those who now adorn themselves with them will 
need the protection of their valets,^"* 

“ What ! ” you say to me, “ your uncle Benjamin 
said all that?” 

“Why not?” 

“ All in one breath? ” 

“ To be sure. What is there in that that is astonish- 
ing ? My grandfather had a jug that held a pint and 
a half, and my uncle emptied it at one draught: he 
called that making tirades.” 

“ And his words ? How were they preserved? ” 

“ My grandfather wrote them down.” 

“ Then he had there, in the open air, all the necessary 
writing materials ? ” 

“ How stupid ! Wasn’t he a summons-server ? ” 

“And the sergeant? Did he have anything more to 
say?” 

“Certainly; it was very necessary that he should 
speak in order that my uncle might reply.” 

Now then, the sergeant said : 

“I have been on the road for three months; I go 


42 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


from farm to farm, and I stay as long as they are will- 
ing to keep me. I play with the children, I tell the 
story of our campaigns to the men, and Fontenoy 
amuses the women with his. frolics. I am in no hurry, 
for I don’t exactly know where I am going. They send 
me back to my fireside, and I have no fireside. My 
father’s stove was long ago staved in, and my arms are 
hollo wer and rustier than two old gun-barrels. Never- 
theless I think that I shall return to my village. Not 
that I expect to he better off there than anywhere else. 
The ground is as hard there as elsewhere, and they do 
not drink brandy in the roads. But what difference 
does it make ? I shall go there just the same. It is a 
sort of sick man’s whim. I shall be the garrison of the 
neighborhood. If they do not wish to support the old 
soldier, they will have at least to bury him, and,” he 
added, “they will certainly be kind enough to place 
upon my grave a little soup for Fontenoy, until he shall 
die of sorrow; for Fontenoy will not let me go away 
alone. When we are alone and he looks at me, he 
promises me that, this good Fontenoy.” 

“So that is the fate that they have made for you?” 
answered Benjamin. “Truly, kings are the most self- 
ish of all beings. If the serpents, of which-our poets 
speak so ill, had a literature, they would make kings 
the symbol of ingratitude. I have read somewhere that, 
when God had made the heart of kings, a dog ran off 
with it, and that, not wishing to begin his work again, 
he put a stone in its place. That seems to me very 
likely. As for the Capets, perhaps they have a lily-root 
in place of a heart ; I defy anyone to prove the con- 


MY UNCLE B^NJAmN. 


43 


“Because these people had a cross made on their 
foreheads with oil, their persons are august,, they are 
majesties, they are we instead of I ; they can do no 
wrong ; if their valet de chamhre should scratch them in 
putting on their shirt, it would be a sacrilege. Their 
little ones are highnesses, these brats, which a woman 
carries in her hand, and whose cradle could be held in 
a hen-coop ; they are very lofty heights, most serene 
mountains. We would willingly gild their nurses’ nip- 
ples. If such is the effect of a little oil, how much we 
ought to respect the anchovies that are pickled in oil 
till we eat them ! • 

“ In the caste of sires, pride goes to the point of mad- 
ness. They are compared to J upiter holding a thunder- 
bolt, and they do not consider themselves too highly 
honored by the comparison. Leave out the thunder- 
bolt, and they would be offended. Nevertheless, Jupi- 
ter has the gout, and it takes two valets to lead him to 
his table or to bed. The rhymester Boileau has, by his 
private authority, ordered the winds to be silent, inas- 
much as he was about to speak of Louis XIV. : 

‘ Et vous, vents, faites silence, 

Je vais parler de Louis.’ 

“And Louis XIV. looked on this as very natural ; 
only it has never occurred to him to order the com- 
manders of his vessels to speak of Louis in order to still 
the tempests. 

“All these poor madmen believe that the space of 
earth over which they reign is theirs; that God has 
given it to them, soil and sub-soil, to be enjoyed, with- 
out disturbance or *hindrance, by them and their de- 


44 


MY U1S.CLE BENJAMIN. 


scendants. Let a courtier tell them that God made the 
Seine expressly to supply the great basin of the Tuil- 
eries, and they will look on him as a man of wit. They 
regard these millions of men around them as their prop- 
erty, the title to whom cannot be disputed on the 
penalty of hanging ; some have come into the world to 
supply them with money ; others to die in their quar- 
rels ; some, who have the clearest and reddest blood, to 
beget mistresses for them. All this evidently results 
from the cross which an old arch-bishop, with his with- 
ered hand, has laid upon their brows. 

“ They take a man in the strength of his youth, they 
put a gun in his hands and a knapsack on his back, 
they adorn his head with a cockade, and they say to 
him : ‘My brother of Prussia has wronged me ; you are 
to attack all his subjects. I have warned them by my 
process-server, whom I call a herald, that on the first of 
April next you will have the honor to present yourself 
at the frontier to strangle them, and that they should 
be ready to give you a warm welcome. Between mon- 
archs these are considerations which we owe each other. 
You will think perhaps at first sight that our enemies 
are men ; I warn you to the contrary ; they are Prus- 
sians ; you will distinguish them from the human race 
by the color of their uniform. Try to do your duty 
well, for I shall be there sitting on my throne to watch 
you. If you bring victory with you when you return 
to France, you will be led beneath the windows of my 
palace; I shall appear in full uniform, and say to you: 
“Soldiers, I am content with ygu.” If you are one 
hundred thousand men, you will have for your share a 
hundred-thousandth of these six words. In case you 


]VIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


should remain on the battle-field, which may very 
easily happen, I will send your death certificate to your 
family, that they may weep for you and that your 
brothers may inherit your property. If you lose an 
arm or a leg, I will pay you what they are worth, but if 
you have the good or ill fortune, whichever you may 
think it, to escape the bullet, wdien you have no longer 
strength enough to carry your knapsack, I will give you 
your furlough, and you can go to die where you like ; 
that will no longer concern me.’ ” 

“That’s just the. way it is,” said the sergeant; 
“when they have . extracted from our blood the phos- 
phorus of which they make their glory, they throw us 
aside as the wine-grower throws on the muck-heap the 
skin of the grape after squeezing out the liquor, or as 
a child throws into the gutter the stone of the fruit 
which he has just eaten.” 

“ That is very wrong of them,” said Machecourt, 
whose mind was at Corvol, and who longed to see his 
brother-in-law there. 

“Machecourt,” said Benjamin, looking at him as- 
kance, “ be more careful of your expressions ; this is no 
laughing matter. Yes, when I see these proud soldiers, 
who have made the glory of their country with their 
blood, obliged, like that poor old Cicero, to spend the 
rest of their life on a cobbler’s bench, while a multitude 
of gilded puppets monopolize the public revenues, and 
prostitutes have cashmeres for their morning wrappers, 
a single thread of which is worth the entire wardrobe 
of a poor house-wife, I am exasperated against kings; 
if I were God, I would put a leaden uniform on their 
bodies, and condemn them to a thousand years of mili- 


l6 


IVIY UNCLE benja:min. 


tary service in the moon, with all their iniquities in 
their knapsacks. The emperors should be corporals.” 

After having recovered his breath and wiped his 
brow, for he was sweating, my worthy great-uncle, 
with emotion and wrath, he took my grandfather 
aside, and said to him : 

“ Suppose we invite this brave man and this glorious 
poodle to breakfast with us at Manette’s ? ” 

“ Hum ! hum ! ” objected my grandfather. 

“ The devil I ” replied Benjamin, “ one does not meet 
every day a poodle who has made an English captain 
prisoner, and every day political banquets are given to 
people who are not worth this honorable quadruped.” 

“ But have you any money ? ” said my grandfather ; 
“ I have only a thirty-sou piece, which your sister gave 
me this morning because, I believe, it is imperfectly 
coined, and she urgently reconnnended me to bring her 
back at least half.” 

“ For my part, I have not a sou, but I am Manette’s 
physician, just as she from time to time is my tavern- 
keeper, and we give each other credit.” 

“ Manette’s physician only ? ” 

“What’s that to you?” 

“ Nothing ; but I warn you that I will not stay more 
than an hour at Manette’s.” 

So my uncle extended his invitation to the sergeant. 
The latter accepted without ceremony, and joyfully 
placed himself between my uncle and my grandfather, 
walking in what soldiers call lock-step. 

They met a bull, which a peasant was driving to 
pasture. Offended undoubtedly by Benjamin’s coat, 
he suddenly started for him. My uncle dodged his 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


4T 


horns, and, as he had joints of steel, he cleared at a 
bound, with no more effort than if he had cut a caper, 
a broad ditch that separated the road from the fields. 
The bull, who was undoubtedly determined to make a 
slash in the red coat, tried to follow my uncle’s exam- 
ple ; but he fell into the middle of the ditch. “ Good 
enough for you ! ” said Benjamin, “ that’s what you get 
by seeking a quarrel with people who are not dreaming 
of you.” But the quadruped, as obstinate as a Russian 
mounting to an assault, was not discouraged by this 
failure ; planting his hoofs in the half-thawed ground, 
he tried to climb the slope. My uncle, seeing that, 
drew his sword, and, while he was pricking the enemy’s 
snout to the best of his ability, he called the peasant, 
and cried : “ My good man, stop your beast ; else I warn 
you that I will pass my sword through his body.” But, 
as he said the words, he let his sword fall into the ditch. 
“ Take off your coat, and throw it to him as quickly as 
you can,” cried Machecourt. “ Hide among the vines,” 
said the peasant. . “Sic him ! sic him ! Fontenoy,” said 
the sergeant. The poodle leaped at the bull, and, as if 
he knew his enemy, bit him on the ham-string. The 
animal then turned his wrath against the dog ; but, 
while he was making havoc with his horns, the peas- 
ant came up and succeeded in passing a noose around 
the bull’s hind legs. This skilful manoeuvre was per- 
fectly successful, and put an end to the hostilities. 

Benjamin returned to the road. He thought that 
Machecourt was going, to laugh at him, but the latter 
was as pale as a sheet and trembled on his legs. 

“ Come, Machecourt, brace up,” said my uncle ; “ else 
I shall have to bleed you. And you, my brave Fonte- 


48 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


noy, you have made to-day a prettier fable than that of 
La Fontaine, entitled : ‘ The Dove and the Ant.’ You 
see, gentlemen, 9, good deed is never lost. Generally 
the benefactor is obliged to give long credit to the 
beneficiary, but he, Fontenoy, has paid me in advance. 
Who the devil would have thought that I would ever 
be under o'bligations to a poodle ? ” 

IVIoulot is hidden among a clump of willows and 
poplars on the left bank of the Beuvron river, at the 
foot of a big hill, up which runs the road to La Chapelle. 
A few houses of the village had already gone up by the 
side of the road, as white and as spick and span as 
peasant women when they go into a place frequented 
by society ; among them was Manette’s wine-shop. At 
sight of the frost-covered sign that hung from the attic- 
window, Benjamin began to sing with his stentorian 
voice : 

“ Amis, il faut faire une pause, 

J’aper9ois Tombre d’un bouchon.” 

On hearing this familiar voice, Manette ran blushing 
to the threshold of her door. 

Manette was really a very pretty person, plump, 
chubby, and white, but perhaps a little too pink ; her 
cheeks would have reminded you of a pool of milk, on 
the surface of which a few drops of wine were floating. 

“Gentlemen,” said Benjamin, “permit me first of all 
to kiss our pretty hostess, as an appetizer for the good 
breakfast which she is going to prepare for us directly.” 

“ Indeed, Monsieur Rathery I ” exclaimed Manette, 
starting back, “you are not made for peasant women ; 
go and kiss Mademoiselle Minxit.” 

“ It seems,” thought my uncle, “ that the report of 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


49 


my marriage has already spread through the country. 
No one but M. Minxit can have spoken of it; hence he 
must be determined to have me for a son-in-law ; so, if 
he should not receive my visit to-day, that would not 
be a reason for breaking off the negotiations.” 

“Manette,” he added, “Mile. Minxit is not in ques- 
tion here ; have you any fish ? ” 

“There are plenty of fish,” said Manette, “in M. 
Minxit’s fish pond.” 

“ Again I ask you, Manette,” said Benjamin, “ have 
you any fish? Be careful what you answer.” 

“Well,” said Manette, “my husband has gone fish- 
ing, and he will soon return.” 

“ Soon does not meet our case ; put on the gridiron 
as many slices of ham as it will hold, and make us an 
omelette of all the eggs in your hen-house.” 

The breakfast was soon ready. While the omelette 
was lea^ling in the frying-pan, the ham was broiling. 
Now, the omelette was almost as soon despatched as 
served. It takes a hen six months to lay twelve eggs, 
a woman a quarter of an hour to convert them into an 
omelette, and three men five minutes to absorb the 
omelette. “See,” said Benjamin, “how much more 
rapid is decomposition than recomposition; countries 
covered with a numerous population grow poorer every 
day. Man is a greedy infant who makes his nurse 
grow thin; the ox does not restore to the fields all the 
grass that he takes from it ; the ashes of the oak tha^t 
we burn do not return as an oak to the forest; the 
zephyr does not carj’y back to the rose-bush the leaves 
of the bouquet that the young girl scatters around her ; 
the candle that burns in front of us does not fall back 


50 


MY UNCLE BENJAIMTN. 


in waxen dew upon the earth ; rivers continually 
despoil continents, and lose in the bosom of the sea the 
matter which they take from their banks ; most of the 
mountains have no verdure left upon their big bald 
craniums; tlie Alps show us their bare and jagged 
bones; the interior of Africa is nothing but a lake of 
sand; Spain is a vast moor, and Italy a great charnel- 
house where there remains only a bed of ashes. 
Wherever great peoples have passed, they have left 
sterility in their tracks. This earth, adorned with ver- 
dure and with flowers, is a consumptive whose cheeks 
are red, but whose life is condemned. A time will 
come when it will be nothing but an inert, dead, icy 
mass, a great sepulchral stone upon which God will 
write : ‘ Here lies the human race.’ Meantime, gentle- 
men, let us profit by the blessings which the earth gives 
us, and, as she is a tolerably good mother, let us drink 
to her long life.” 

They came then to the ham. My grandfather ate 
from a sense of duty, because man miist eat to main- 
tain his health and must have blood in order to serve 
writs ; Benjamin ate for amusement ; but the sergeant 
ate like a man who sits down to table for no other pur- 
^pose, and he did not utter a word. 

At table Benjamin was famous ; but his noble 
stomach was not exempt from jealousy, a base passion 
which dims the most brilliant qualities. 

, He watched the sergeant with .the vexed air of a 
man outdone, as Caesar would have watched, from the 
height of the Capitol, Bonaparte .winning the battle 
of Marengo. After having contemplated his man for 
some time in silence, he thought fit to address these 
words to him : 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


51 


“ Drinking and eating are two beings that resemble 
each other ; at first' sight you would take them for own 
cousins. But drinking is as much above eating as the 
eagle who alights upon the mountain peak is above 
the raven who perches on the tree-top. Eating is a 
necessity of the stomach ; drinking is a necessity of 
the soul. Eating is only a common workman, while 
drinking is an artist. Drinking inspires poets with 
pleasant ideas, philosophers with noble thoughts, musi- 
cians with melodious strains ; eating gives them only 
indigestion. Now, I flatter myself, sergeant, that I 
could drink quite as well as you ; I even think that 
I could drink better ; but, when it comes to eating, I 
am the merest novice beside you. You could cope 
with Arthus in person ; I even think that on a turkey 
you could go him one wing better.” 

“ You see,” answered the sergeant, “I eat for yester- 
day, to-day, and to-morrow.” 

“Permit me tlien to serve you for day after-to- 
morrow this last slice of ham.” 

“ Thank you very much,” said the sergeant, “ there 
is an end to everything.” 

‘‘Well, the Creator who has made soldiers to pass 
suddenly from extreme abundance to extreme want has 
given to them, as to the camel, two stomachs; their 
second stomach is their knapsack. Take this ham, 
which neither Machecourt nor I want, and put it in 
your knapsack.” 

“ No,” said the soldier, “ I do not need to lay up pro- 
visions ; I always get food enough ; permit me to offer 
this ham to Fontenoy ; we are in the habit of sharing 
everything together, on days of feast as on days of 
fast.” 


>rY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


> 5 ^ 


“ You have there, indeed, a dog who deserves to be 
well taken care of,” said my uncle ; “ will you sell him 
to me? ” 

“ Monsieur ! ” exclaimed the sergeant, quickly placing 
his hand upon his poodle. 

“ Pardon me, worthy man, pardon me ; I am dis- 
tressed at having offended you ; I spoke only in jest ; 
I know very well that to propose to a poor man to sell 
his dog is lil^e proposing to a mother to sell her child.” 

“You will never make me believe,” said my grand- 
father, “ that one can love a dog as much as a child ; I, 
too, once had a poodle, a poodle that was well worth 
yours, sergeant, — -be it said without olfence to Fonte- 
noy, — save that he has taken prisoner nothing but the 
tax-collector’s wig. Well, one day, when I had lawyer 
Page to dinner, he ran off with a calf’s head, and that 
very night I passed him under the mill-wheel.” 

“ What you say proves nothing ; you have a wife and 
six children ; it is quite work enough for you to love 
all these people without forming a romantic affection 
for a poodle ; but I am talking of a poor devil isolated 
among men and with no relative but his dog. Put a 
man with a dog in a desert island, in another desert 
island put a woman with her child, and I will wager 
that in six months’ time the man will love the dog, pro- 
vided the dog is amiable, as well as the woman will love 
her child.” 

“ I can conceive,” answered my grandfather, “ that a 
traveller may like a dog to keep him company, that an 
old woman that lives alone in her room may like a pug 
with which to babble all day long. But that a man 
should love a dog with real affection, that he should 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 58 

love him as a Christian, that is what I deny, that is 
what I deem impossible.” 

“And I tell you that under certain circumstances 
you would love even a rattlesnake ; the loving fibre in 
man cannot remain entirely inert. The human soul 
abhors a vacuum ; observe attentively the most hard- 
ened egoist, and at last you will find, like a little flower 
among the stones, an affection hidden under a fold of 
his soul. ' 

“ It is a general rule, to which there is no exception, 
that man must love something. The dragoon who has 
no mistress loves his horse ; the young girl who has no 
lover loves her bird ; the prisoner, who cannot in de- 
cency love his jailer, loves the spider that spins its web 
in the window of his cell, or the fly that comes down to 
him in a ray of sunlight. When we find nothing ani- 
mate to absorb our affections, we love material objects, 
— a ring, a snuff-box, a tree, a flower; the Dutchman 
feels a passion for his tulips, and the antiquary for his 
cameos.” 

Just then Manette’s husband came in with a fat eel 
in his basket. 

“ Machecourt,” said Benjamin, “it is noon, — that is 
to say, dinner-time ; suppose we make a dinner of 
this eel?” 

“ It is time to go,” said Machecourt, “ and we shall 
dine at M. Minxit’s .” 

“ And you, sergeant ? Suppose we eat this eel ? ” 

“ For my part,” said the sergeant, “ I am in no 
hurry ; as I am not going anywhere in particular, I 
spend every night at home.” 

“Very well said ! And the respectable poodle, what 
is his opinion on this point ? ” 


54 


JVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


The poodle looked at Benjamin and wagged his tail 
two or three times. 

“Well, silence gives consent: so, Machecourt, there 
are three of us against you ; you must bow to the will 
of the majority. The majority, you see, my friend, 
is stronger than the rest of the world. Put ten philos- 
ophers on one side and eleven fools on the other, and 
the fools will carry the day.”" 

“ The eel is indeed a very fine one,” said my grand- 
father, “ and, if Manette has a little fresh bacon, it will 
make an excellent matelote. But, the devil ! what 
about my writ ? That must be served.” 

“ Mark this,” said Benjamin ; “ it will undoubtedly 
be necessary for some one to lend me his arm to escort 
me back to Clamecy. If you shirk this pious duty, I 
will no longer own you as my brother-in-law.” 

Now, as Machecourt was very anxious to continue as 
Benjamin’s brother-in-law, he remained. 

The eel being ready, they sat down at table again. 
Manette’s matelote was a chef-d'^ oeuvre ; the sergeant 
did not tire of admiring it. But the chefs-d'oeuvre of 
the cook are ephemeral ; we scarcely give them time to 
cool. There is only one thing in the arts that can be 
compared to culinary products ; I refer to the products 
of journalism ; and even a stew can be warmed over, a 
terrine oifoie gras may keep a whole month, and a ham 
may see its admirers gather about it many times; but 
a newspaper article has no to-morrow ; before we reach 
the end, we have forgotten the beginning, and, when 
we have finished it, we throw it on our desk, as we 
throw our napkin on the table after we have dined. 
Consequently I do not understand how a man of liter- 


>nr TJKCLE BEKJAMIK. 


55 


ary value can consent to waste his talents in the obscure 
works of journalism ; how he who might write on parch- 
ment can make up his mind to scribble on the blotting- 
paper of a journal ; certainly it must occasion him no 
small heart-break to see the leaves upon which he has 
placed his thought fall noiselessly with those thousand 
other leaves which the immense tree of the press shakes 
daily from its branches. 

Meanwhile the hand of the cuckoo clock kept moving 
on, while my uncle philosophized. Benjamin did not 
notice that it was dark until Manette placed a lighted 
candle on the table. Then, without waiting for the 
observations of Machecourt, who for that matter was 
scarcely in a condition to observe anything, he declared 
that they had had enough for one day, and that it was 
time to return to Clamecy. 

The sergeant and my grandfather went out first. 
Manette stopped my uncle at the threshold. 

“ Monsieur Bathery,” said she, “ see here.” 

“ What is this scrawl ? ” said my uncle. ‘‘ ‘ August 10, 
three bottles of wine with a cream cheese ; September 1, 
with M. Page, nine bottles and a plate of- fish.’ God 
forgive me, I believe it is a bill.” 

“ Undoubtedly,” said Manette ; “ I see clearly that it 
is time to balance our accounts, and I hope that you 
will send me yours very soon.” 

“ For my part, Manette, I have no account to render. 
It is an agreeable duty indeed to touch the plump 
white arm of a pretty woman like yourself.” 

“ You say that to laugh at me. Monsieur Rathery,” 
exclaimed Manette, thrilling with delight. 

“ I say it because it is true, because I think it,” an- 


56 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIN. 


swered my uncle. “ As for your bill, my poor Manette, 
it comes at a fatal moment ; I am obliged to declare to 
you that I haven’t the smallest coin at the present hour ; 
but, stay, here is my watch ; you shall keep it until I 
have paid you. It is in the best possible condition ; it 
hasn’t been going since yesterday.” 

Manette began to weep, and tore up the bill. 

My uncle kissed her on the cheek, on the forehead, 
on the eyes, and wherever he could find a place to kiss 
her. 

“ Benjamin,” said Manette to him, leaning over to 
whisper in his ear, “ if you need money, tell me so.” 

“No, no, Manette,” my uncle answered quickly, “I 
do not need your money. The devil ! that would be 
getting serious. To make you pay for the happiness 
you give me ! Why, that would be an indignity ; I 
should be as vile as a prostitute ! ” And he kissed 
Manette as he had done before. 

“ Oh, do not embarrass yourself. Monsieur Rathery,” 
said Jean-Pierre, who just then came in. 

“ What, you were there, Jean-Pierre ? Are you jeal- 
ous, then ? I warn you that I have a profound aver- 
sion for jealous people.” 

“ Well, it seems to me that I have a good right to be 
jealous.” 

“ Imbecile ! you always take things wrong. These 
gentlemen have charged me to testify to your wife their 
satisfaction for the excellent matelote which she has 
made for us, and I was fulfilling the commission.” 

“ There was a good way, it seems to me, to testify 
your satisfaction to Manette ; and that was by paying 
her, do you understand ? ” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


57 


“ In the first place, J ean-Pierre, we are not dealing 
with yon : it is Manette who keeps this tavern ; as for 
paying you, rest easy, I charge myself with the bill; 
you know that no one ever loses anything by me ; and 
besides, if you are afraid of waiting too long, I will 
straightway pass my sword through your body. Does 
that suit you, Jean-Pierre ? ” 

And with these words he went out. 

Up to this time Benjamin had only been over-ex- 
cited; he contained all the elements of intoxication, 
without yet being intoxicated. But, on leaving Ma- 
nette’s wine-shop, the cold seized upon his brain and 
legs. 

“ Hello, there, Machecourt, where are you ? ” 

“ Here I am, holding on to the lappel of your coat.” 

“You hold me, that’s good, that does me honor, you 
flatter me. You mean to say thereby that I am in a 
condition to sustain both my hypostasis and your own. 
At another time, yes ; but now I am as weak as the 
most ordinary of men when he has remained too long 
at dinner. I have engaged your arm, I call upon you to 
offer it to me.” 

“At another time, yes,” said Machecourt; “but there 
is a difficulty in the way ; I cannot walk myself.” 

“ Then you have forfeited your honor, you have failed 
in the most sacred of duties ; I had engaged your arm, 
you were to save yourself for both of us ; but I forgive 
your weakness. Homo sum, . . . that is to say, I forgive 
you on one condition : that you go directly for the 
town constable and two peasants carrying torches to 
escort me back to Clamecy. You shall take one of the 
officer’s arms, and I the other.” 


58 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


‘‘But the constable has but one arm,” said .my grand- 
father. 

“Then the valid arm belongs to me. The best that 
I can do for you is to allow you to hang on to my cue, 
and you must take care not to untie the ribbon. Or, 
if you prefer, get on the poodle’s back.” 

“Gentlemen,” said the sergeant, “why look so far 
for what is close at hand? I have two good arms, 
which fortunately the bullet has spared, and I place 
them at your disposition.” 

“You are a brave man, sergeant,” said my uncle, 
taking the old soldier’s right arm. 

“An excellent man,” said my grandfather, taking 
his left arm. 

“ I charge myself with your future, sergeant.” 

“And I too, sergeant, I charge myself with it, al- 
though, to tell the truth, any. charge at the present 
moment ”... 

“ I will teach you to pull teeth, sergeant.” 

“And I, sergeant, will teach your poodle to be a 
bailiff’s keeper.” 

“ In three months you will be able to be a fakir at 
the fairs.” 

“ In three months your poodle, if he behaves himself, 
will be able to earn thirty sous a day.” 

“ The sergeant shall serve his apprenticeship by prac- 
tising on you, Machecourt ; you have some decayed old 
stumps that torment you; we will pull them out, one 
every two days, in order not to fatigue you, and when 
we have finished with the stumps, we will pull out your 
gums.” 

“ And I will put my bailiff’s keeper at the service of 


INIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


59 


your creditors, old dead-beat. . I will proceed to tell 
you in advance of tlie duties you will have to fulfil 
toward him. You must give him, in the morning, bread 
and cheese, or, in the season, a bunch of little radishes; 
for dinner, soup and boiled beef, and for supper a roast 
and a salad, though the salad may be . replaced by a 
glass of wine. You will take care that he does not pine 
away in your hands, for nothing does so much honor to 
a debtor as a good fat keeper. On his side he must be- 
have properly toward you ; he has no right to disturb 
you in your occupations, to play, for instance, the clari- 
nette, or sound the hunting horn.” 

“ Meantime I offer the sergeant a residence at the 
house ; you do not disapprove, do you, Machecourt ? ” 

“ Not exactly, but I am very much afraid that your 
dear sister will disown you.” 

“ Oh, gentlemen,” said the sergeant, “ let us under- 
stand each other. Do not expose me to insult ; for, I 
warn you, one or the other of you will have to answer 
for it.” 

“ Rest easy, sergeant,” said my uncle ; “ and, if the 
case occurs, you will have to address yourself to me ; 
for Machecourt doesn’t know how to fight, except when 
his adversary gives him the sword and keeps the 
scabbard.” 

While thus philosophizing, they reached the door of 
the house. My grandfather was not anxious to enter 
first, and my uncle preferred to enter second. 

To settle the matter, they entered both together, 
knocking against each other like two gourds carried 
at the end of a stick. 

The sergeant and the poodle, whose intrusion mack 


60 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


the cat growl like a royal tigress, brought up the 
rear. 

“My dear sister,” said Benjamin, “ I have the honor 
to introduce to you a pupil in surgery and a ” . . . 

“ Benjamin is beginning to talk nonsense to you,” 
interrupted my grandfather; “don’t listen to him. 
Monsieur is a soldier sent us to be lodged and whom 
we met at the door.” 

My grandmother was a good woman, but something 
of a shrew; she thought that to talk very loud added 
to her importance. She had the greatest desire in the 
world to get angry, and all the more desire because she 
had tlie right. But she prided herself on her good 
breeding, being a descendant of a lawyer ; and the pres- 
ence of a stranger restrained her. 

She offered the sergeant some supper. The latter 
having declined and for good reason, she bade one of 
her children take him to the neighboring tavern, with an 
order that breakfast be given him in the morning before 
his departure. 

My grandfather always bent like a rush, — peace- 
able, worthy man that he was, — when he saw a conjugal 
storm brewing. Up to a certain point this weakness 
was perhaps excusable in him, inasmuch as he was 
always in the wrong. 

He had clearly seen the clouds massing on his wife’s 
wrinkled brow ; and so the sergeant had hardly reached 
the threshold when he had gained his bed, into which 
he found his way as best he could. As for Benjamin, 
he was incapable of such cowardice. A sermon in five 
points, like a game of ScartS^ would not have sent him 
to bed a minute before his time. He was willing that 


IVry UI?^CLE BEKJAMIK. 


61 


his sister should scold him, but he could not consent to 
fear her. awaited the tempest that was about to 
burst forth, with the indifference of a rock, his hands in 
his pockets and his back resting against the mantel- 
shelf, and humming between his lips : 

“ Malbrough s’en va-t-en guerre, 

Mironton, mironton, mirontaine, 

Malbrough s’en va-t-en guerre, 

Savoir s’il reviendra.” 

My grandmother had scarcely conducted the sergeant 
to the door, when, impatient for the fray, she came 
back to confront Benjamin. 

“Well, Benjamin, are you satisfied with your day’s 
work ? Do you like the situation in which you are ? 
Or must I go and draw a bottle of white wine for 
you ? ” 

“ Thank you, dear sister. As you have said very 
elegantly, my day’s work is done.” 

“ A fine day’s work, indeed ! It would take many of 
that sort to pay your debts. Have you at least reason 
enough left to tell me how M. Minxit received you ? ” 
Mironton, mironton, mirontaine, dear sister,” said 
Benjamin. 

“ Ah ! mironton, mironton, mirontaine,'"’ cried my 
grandmother; “just wait, and I will give you miron- 
ton, mirontaine." 

" And she seized the tongs. My uncle took three 
steps backward and drew his sword. 

“ Dear sister,” said he, putting himself on guard, “ I 
hold you responsible for all the blood that is about to 
be shed here.” 

I, But my grandmother, although she was descended 


5 


62 MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 

from a lawyer, had no fear of a sword. She dealt her 
brother a blow with the tongs that struck him on the 
thumb and made him drop his sword. 

Benjamin hopped about the room, squeezing his 
wounded thumb in his left hand. As for my grand- 
father, although he was good among the best, he was 
bursting with laughter under the bed-clothes. He 
could not help saying to my uncle : 

“ Well, how do you like that thrust ? This time you 
had both the scabbard and the sword. You cannot say 
that the weapons were not equal.” 

“ Alas ! no, Machecourt, they were not ; for that, I 
ought to have had the shovel. All the same, your wife 
— for I can no longer say my dear sister — deserves to 
wear at her side, instead of a distaff, a pair of tongs. 
With a pd-ir of tongs she would win battles. I am con- 
quered, I confess, and I must submit to the law of the 
conqueror. Well, no, we did not go to Corvol; we 
stopped at Mahette’s.” 

“ Always at Manette’s, a married woman ! Are you 
not ashamed, Benjamin, of such conduct ? ” 

“Ashamed! And why, dear sister? As soon as a 
tavern-keeper gets married, must one no longer break- 
fast at her establishment? That is not my way of 
looking at it; to a true philosopher a tavern has no 
sex. Isn’t that so, Machecourt ? ” 

“ When I meet her at the market, your Manette, I 
will treat the wench as she deserves.” 

“ Dear sister, when you meet Manette at the market, 
buy her as many cream cheeses as you like, but if you 
insult her ”... 

“Well, if I should insult her, what would you do?” 


]MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


63 


“ I would leave you, I would go away to the islands, 
and I would take Machecourt with me, I warn you.” 

My grandmother understood that all these transports 
would end in nothing, and she at once decided upon her 
course. 

“You shall follow the example of that drunkard in 
bed yonder,” said she ; “ you need to lie down as much 
as he. But to-morrow I shall take you myself to M. 
Minxit’s, and we shall see if you will stop on the way.” 

“ Mironton^ mironton^ mirontaine^' hummed Benja- 
min, as he started off for bed. 

The idea of the morrow’s proceedings disturbed my 
uncle’s usually peaceful, deep, and sound slumbers ; he 
dreamed aloud, and this is what he said : 

“ You say, sergeant, that you have dined like a king. 
That is not the word; you use the rhetorical figure 
known as the litotes. You have dined better than an 
emperor. Kings and emperors, in spite of all their 
power, cannot have anything extra, and you have had 
something extra. You see, sergeant, everything is rela- 
tive. This matelote is certainly not worth a truffled 
partridge. Nevertheless, it has tickled the nerves of 
your palate more agreeably than a truffled partridge 
would tickle the king’s. Why is that ? Because his 
majesty’s palate is hlasS in the matter of truffles, 
whereas yours is not accustomed to matelotes. 

“ My dear sister tells me : ‘ Benjamin, do something 
to get rich. Benjamin, marry Mile. Minxit that you 
may have a good dowry.’ What good would that do 
me ? Does the butterfly take the trouble to build a 
nest for the two or three months of fine days allotted 
it for its life? I am convinced that enjoyments are 


64 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


relative to position, and that at the end of the year the 
beggar and the rich man have had the same amount of 
happiness. 

“ Each individual becomes accustomed to his situa- 
tion, be it good or bad. The cripple no longei* per 
ceives that he walks with a crutch, or the rich man 
that he has a carriage. The poor snail who carries his 
house on his back enjoys a day of perfume and sun- 
shine as much as the bird who chirps above him in the 
branches. It is not the cause that is to be considered, 
but the effect that it produces. Is not the journeyman 
sitting on his bench in front of his cottage as comfort- 
able as the king on the eider-down cushion of his arm- 
chair ? Does not the peasant eat his soup of cabbage 
with as much pleasure as the king eats his soup of 
crabs ? And does not the beggar sleep as well in the 
straw as the great lady under her silk curtains and 
between the perfumed linen of her bed? The child 
who finds a sou is happier than the banker who has 
found a louis, and the poor peasant who inherits an 
acre of ground is as triumphant as the king whose 
armies have conquered a province and who makes his 
people strike up a Te Beum. 

“ Every evil here below is compensated by a good, 
and every good that parades itself is attenuated by an 
invisible evil. God has a thousand ways of making 
compensations. If he has given good dinners to one, 
to another he gives a little better appetite, and that 
re-establishes the equilibrium. To the rich man he has 
given the fear of losing and the care of keeping, and to 
the beggar carelessness. In sending us into this place 
of exile he has laden us all with an almost equal bag- 


MY tJNCLE BENJAMIN. 65 

gage of misery and comfort. If it were otherwise, he 
would not he just, for all men are his children. 

“And why, then, in fact, should the rich man be 
happier than the poor man ? To be sure, he does no 
work ; but he has not the pleasure of resting. 

“ He has fine clothes ; but all the charm of them is 
enjoyed by those who look at him. When the church- 
warden makes a saint’s toilet, does he do it for the saint 
or for his adorers ? ' For the rest, does not a hump-back 
show as plainly under a velvet coat as under a linsey- 
woolsey ? 

“ The rich man has two, three, four, ten valets in his 
service. My God ! why proudly add this quantity of 
useless members to one’s body, when it needs but four 
to serve our person ? The man accustomed to be 
served is an unfortunate, crippled in all his members, 
who ha'fe to be fed. 

“ This rich man has a city mansion and a country 
house ; but of what use is the country house when the 
owner is in the mansion, or the mansion when he is in 
the country house ? What boots it that his lodgings 
consist of twenty rooms, when he can occupy only one 
at a time ? 

“ Adjoining his country house, he has for his dreamy 
promenades an immense park, enclosed by a wall of 
lime and sand ten feet high ; but, in the first place, 
suppose he has no dreams? and then is not the open 
country, enclosed only by the horizon and belonging 
to all, as beautiful as his great park? 

“ In the middle of the aforesaid park, a canal fed by 
a little stream drags along its greenish and sickly 
waters, to the surface of which adhere, like plasters, 


66 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN 


the broad leaves of the water-lily ; but is not the river 
that flows freely through the open country clearer and 
more liquid than his canal? 

“ Dahlias of one hundred and fifty varieties line his 
walks ; grant it ; I give you four per cent, additional, 
which makes one hundred and fifty-six varieties; but 
is not the elm-shaded road that winds through the grass 
like a serpent well worth his walks ? And the hedges 
festooned with wild roses and sprinkled with hawthorn, 
the hedges which mingle with the wind their tufts of 
many colors and scatter flowers by the wayside, — are 
they not well worth those dahlias whose merits can 
only be appreciated by the horticulturist? 

“ The aforesaid park belongs to him exclusively, you 
say : you are mistaken ; it is only the purchase-deed 
locked up in his secretary of which he has the exclusive 
ownership, and he only has that on condition that the 
ticks do not eat it. 

“ His park belongs to him much less than to the birds 
that build their nests there, the rabbits who browse 
amid the wild thyme, and the insects who rustle under 
the leaves. 

“ Can his watchman keep the serpent from coiling in 
the grass, or the toad from nestling under the moss? 

“The rich man gives parties ; but are not the dances 
under the old lindens of the promenade, to the sound 
of the bag-pipe, parties also? 

“ The rich man has a carriage. He has a carriage, 
the unfortunate ! But is he then a cripple or a para- 
lytic ? There is a woman yonder carrying one child in 
her arms, while another gambols about her, running 
after the butterflies and flowers. Which of the two 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


67 


little ones is in the more agreeable situation? A car- 
riage ! But that is an infirmity ; let a wheel break, or 
your horse cast. a shoe, and there you are a cripple. 
Those grandees who, in the time of Louis XIV., had 
themselves carried to the ball-room on a litter, poor 
people who had legs to dance and none to walk, — how 
much they must have suffered from the fatigue of those 
who carried them ! 

“ You think that to go in a carriage is an enjoyment 
of the rich man ; you are mistaken ; it is only a sort of 
slavery which his vanity imposes upon him. If it were 
otherwise, why should this gentleman and this lady, 
who are as ‘thin as a bundle of thorns and whom an ass 
could carry with the greatest ease, harness four horses 
to their coach ? 

‘‘ For my part, when I am on the greensward, in moss 
up to my ankles ; when I am wandering at will along a 
beautiful cross-road, with hands in my pockets, dream- 
ing and leaving behind me, like one of the damned 
passing, the blue smoke from my blackened pipe ; or 
when I follow slowly, in the beautiful moonlight, the 
white road festooned on one side by the shadow of the 
hedges, I should very much like to see anyone have the 
insolence to offer me ^ carriage.” 

With these words, my uncle awoke. 

“What!” you say; “your uncle dreamed that? 
And out loud?” 

Why, what is there that’s astonishing in that? Did 
not Madame George Sand make the reverend father 
Spiridion dream aloud a whole chapter in one of her 
novels? Has not M. Golb^ry dreamed aloud in the 
Chamber, for a whole hour, of a proposition on the re- 


68 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


port of the parliamentary debates ? And have not we 
ourselves been dreaming for the last thirteen years that 
we have made a revolution ? When my uncle had not 
had time to philosophize during the day, he philoso- 
phized while dreaming, to make up for it. That is how 
I explain the phenomenon the result of which I have 
just related to you. 


CHAPTER IV. 


HOW MY UNCLE PASSED HIMSELF OFF FOE THE WANDEEING 
JEW. 

Meanwhile my grandmother had put on her shot- 
colored silk dress, which she took from her drawer only 
on grand and solemn festival occasions ; she ,Jiad fas- 
tened over her round cap, in the form of a head-band, 
the finest of her ribbons, a cherry-red ribbon as broad 
as one’s hand and broader ; she had got ready her short 
cloak of black taffeta trimmed with lace of the same 
color, and she had taken from its box her new lynx muff, 
a present which Benjamin had made her on her birth- 
day, and for which he still owed the furrier. When she 
was thus dressed up, she ordered one of her children to 
go after M. Durand’s ass, a fine little animal, which at 
the last fair at Billy had cost three pistoles, and was let 
for thirty-six deniers more than ordinary asses. 

Then she called Benjamin. When the latter came 
down, M. Durand’s ass, with his two baskets hanging 
over his flanks and between them a large and very 
white pillow, was fastened before the door eating his 
provision of bran that had been served him in a basket 
on a chair. 

Benjamin first anxiously inquired whether Mache- 
court was there to drink a glass of white wine with 
him. His sister having told him that he had gone out, 
he added : 

“ I hope at least, my good sister, that you will be 


70 


WY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


friendly enough to take a little glass of ratafia with 
me.” For my uncle’s stomach knew how to put itself 
within the reach of all stomachs. 

My grandmother did not dislike ratafia, on the con- 
trary; she accepted Benjamin’s proposition, and per- 
mitted him to go after thq carafe. Finally, after hav- 
ing warned my father, who was the oldest child, not 
to beat his brothers, and Premoins, who was indisposed, 
to ask in case he felt certain needs, and after having 
set Surgie her stint of knitting work, she mounted the 
little ass. 

Long live the earth and the sun ! The neighbors 
had gathered in their door- ways to see her start ; for in 
those days to see a woman of the middle class dressed 
up on any other day than Sunday was an event of which 
everyone who witnessed it tried to penetrate the causes, 
and upon which he built a system. 

Benjamin, cleanly shaven and superabundantly pow- 
dered, and as red moreover as a poppy spreading in the 
morning sun after a stormy night, followed on behind, 
uttering from time to time a vigorous “ Gee-hup ” in a 
chest C, and pricking the animal with the point of his 
rapier. 

M. Durand’s ass, thus pricked in the loins by my 
uncle’s sword, went very well ; he went too well even 
to suit my grandmother, who bobbed up and down on 
her pillow like a shuttlecock on a battledore. But at 
some distance from the spot where the road to Moulot 
separates from the road to La Chapelle to go on to its 
humble destination, she perceived that the gait of her 
ass slackened, like a jet of molten metal which thickens 
and moves slower the farther it gets from the furnace ; 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIN. 


liis bell, which up to that time had kept up a proud at 
very pronounced jingling, now gave forth only spi 
mo die sighs, like a voice in the hour of the death agony. 
My grandmother turned around to seek an explanation 
from Benjamin ; but the latter had disappeare-d, melted 
like a ball of wax, conjured away, lost like a midge in 
space ; no one could give any news of hirri. You can 
imagine the vexation that my grandmothe'i* felt at Ben- 
jamin’s sudden disappearance. She said to^ herself that 
he did not deserve the trouble that they took to secure 
his happiness ; that his indifference was incurable ; that 
he would always stagnate there; that he was a marsh 
whose waters could not be made to flow. For a mo- 
ment she felt a desire to abandon him to his destiny, 
and even to no more plait his shirts ; but her queenly 
character came uppermost; she had begun, and she 
must finish. She swore that she would find Benjamin 
again and take him to M. Minxit’s, even though she 
had to fasten him to the tail of her ass. It is by such 
firmness of resolution that great enterprises are carried 
to their conclusion. 

A little peasant, who was tending his sheep at the 
fork of the two roads, told her that the red man whom 
she had lost had gone down toward the village nearly a 
quarter of an hour before. My grandmother^ urged on 
her ass in that direction, and such was the ascendency 
that her indignation gave her over this quadruped that 
he began to trot of himself, out of pure deference to his 
rider, as if he desired to do homage to her grand char- 
acter. 

The village of Moulot seemed to be in an extraor- 
dinary commotion ; the Moulotats, generally so sedate 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


•d in whose brains there was never more fermentation 
an in a cream cheese, seemed all to be in transports. 
The peasants were hurrying down from the neighboring 
hillsidbvs; the women and children were running and 
calling each other ; all spinning-wheels were abandoned, 
and all dkdaffs at rest. My grandmother inquired the 
cause of this commotion. They told her that the 
Wandering tiTew had just arrived at Moulot, and was 
breakfastinf^ in the market-place. She understood at 
once that vnis pretended Wandering Jew was no other 
than Benjamin, and, indeed, she was not slow in per- 
ceiving him from the height of her ass, in the middle of 
a circle of idle bystanders. 

Above this moving ribbon of black and white heads, 
the gable of his three-cornered hat rose with great 
majesty, like the slate-colored steeple of a church amid 
the moss-clad roofs of a village. They had set for him 
in the market-place itself a little table where he had 
been served a half-bottle of wine and a little loaf of 
bread, and before which he was passing to and fro with 
the gravity of a great sacrifice!’, now taking a swallow 
of white wine, now breaking a bit from his little loaf. 

My grandmother urged her ass into the crowd and 
soon found herself in the front rank. 

“What are you doing here, you wretch?” said she 
to my uncle, shaking her fist at him. 

“You see, Madame, I wander; lam Ahasuerus, 
commonly called the Wandering Jew. As in the 
course of my travels I have heard much said of the 
beauty of this little village and the amiability of its 
inhabitants, I resolved to breakfast here.” 

Then, approaching her, he said in a low voice : 


MY UNCLE benjaivun. 73 

“ In five minutes I follow you, but not a word more, 
I beg of you ; the evil might be irreparable ; these im- 
beciles would be capable of killing me, if they should 
discover that I am making sport of them.” 

The eulogy of Moulot, which Benjamin had suc- 
ceeded in interpolating into his reply to his sister, re- 
paired or rather prevented the check which her im- 
prudent rebuke would otherwise have caused him to 
suffer, and a thrill of pride ran through the assembly. 

“ Monsieur Wandering Jew,” said a peasant in whose 
mind still lingered some doubt, “ who, then, is this lady 
who just now shook her fist at you ? ” 

“My good friend,” answered my uncle, not at all 
disconcerted, she is the Holy Virgin, whom God has 
ordered me to escort on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem on 
that little ass. She is really a good woman, but a little 
talkative ; she is ill-humored this morning because she 
has lost her rosary.” 

“ And why is not the infant Jesus with her ? ” 

“ God did not wish her to take him along, because 
just now he has the small-pox.” 

Then the objections fell upon Benjamin as thick as 
hail ; but my uncle was not a man to be frightened by 
the dolts of Moulot ; • danger electrified him, and he 
parried with admirable dexterity all the thrusts that 
were made at him, which did not prevent him from now 
and then wetting his whistle with a swallow of white 
wine, and, to tell the truth, he was already at his 
seventh half-bottle. 

The village schoolmaster, as the learned man of the 
neighborhood, was the first to enter the lists. 

“How does it happen, then, Monsieur Wandering 


74 


>rY UNCLE BENJAISITN. 


Jew, that you have no beard ? It is said in the Brus- 
sels lament that you are heavily bearded, and every- 
where you are represented with a great white beard 
which reaches down to your girdle.” 

“It soiled too easily, Monsieur schoolmaster. I 
asked the good God’s permission to discard that great 
ugly beard, and he has passed it into my cue.” 

“ But,” continued the teacher, “ how do you manage 
to shave, since you cannot stop ? ” 

“ God has provided for that, my dear Monsieur 
schoolmaster. Every morning he sends me the patron 
of the barbers in the shape of a butterfly, who shaves 
me with the edge of his wing, while hovering around 
me.” 

“But, Monsieur Jew,” the schoolmaster continued, 
“ the good God has been very stingy with you in plac- 
ing at your disposition only five sous at a time.” 

“ My friend,” rejoined my uncle, crossing his arms 
over his breast and bowing profoundly, “let us bless 
the decrees of God ; it is probably because that was all 
the money he had in his pocket.” 

“I should very much like to know,” said the old 
tailor of the neighborhood, “how they succeeded in 
taking your measure for your coat, — which, by the 
way, fits you like a glove, — since you are never at 
rest ? ” 

“ You should have noticed, you who are of the trade, 
respectable pique-prune^ that this coat was not made by 
the hand of man ; every year, on the first of April, there 
grows on my back a light coat of red serge, and on All 
Saints’ Day a heavy coat of red velvet.” 

“ Then,” said a youngster, over whose waggish face 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


75 


hung tresses of light hair, “you must wear it out very 
fast ; it is not a fortnight now since All Saints’ Day, 
and your coat is already threadbare and white along the 
seams.” 

Unfortunately the father of the little philosopher was 
standing beside him. “ Go hack to the house and see 
if I’m there,” he said to him, giving him a kick ; and 
he begged my uncle to excuse the impertinence of this 
little fellow, whose schoolmaster neglected to teach him 
his religion. 

“ Gentlemen,” cried the schoolmaster, “ I call you all 
to witness, and Monsieur Wandering Jew also, that 
Nicolas attacks my reputation; he continually assails 
the village authorities ; I am going to take him by his 
tongue.” 

“Yes,” said Nicolas, “there’s a fine authority for 
you ; attack me when you like ; I shall find no diffi- 
culty in proving the truth of what I say; the bailiff 
shall question Chariot. The other day I asked him 
which was Jacob’s most remarkable son, and he an- 
swered Pharaoh ; mother Pintot is my witness.” 

“ Oh ! gentlemen,” said my uncle, “ do hot quarrel 
on my account ; I should be grieved if my arrival in 
this beautiful village should be the occasion of a law- 
suit among you ; the wool of my coat has not yet fully 
grown, as we are now only at St. Martin’s Day ; that is 
what led little Chariot into error. Monsieur school- 
master was unaware of this circumstance, and conse- 
quently could not teach it to his pupils ; I hope that 
M. Nicolas is satisfied with this explanation.” 


CHAPTER y. 

MT UNCLE WORKS A MIRACLE. 

My uncle was about to break up the meeting, when 
be noticed a pretty peasant girl trying to make a pas- 
sage for herself through the crowd ; as he loved young 
girls at least as well as Jesus Christ loved little chil- 
dren, he signalled to the bystanders to allow her to 
approach. 

“ I should very much like to know,” said the young 
Moulotate with her finest bow, the bow that she made to 
the bailiff when, going to carry him cream, she met him 
on her way, “ whether what old Gothon says is the pure 
truth : she pretends that you work miracles.” 

“ Undoubtedly,” answered my uncle, “ when they are 
not too difficult.” 

“ In that case, could you by a miracle cure my father, 
who has been sick since morning with a disease with 
which nobody is familiar?” 

“Why not?” said my uncle; “but first of all, my 
pretty child, you must permit me to kiss you ; other- 
wise the miracle will amount to nothing.” 

And he kissed the young Moulotate on both cheeks, 
damned sinner that he was. 

“ What ! ” exclaimed in his rear a voice which he 
knew well, “ does the Wandering Jew kiss women ? ” 

He turned around and saw Manette. 

“ Undoubtedly, my beautiful lady ; God permits me 
to kiss three a year ; that is the second one that I have 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 77 

kissed this year, and, if you like, you shall be the 
third.” 

The idea of working a miracle fired Benjamin’s 
ambition ; to pass himself off for the Wandering Jew, 
even at Moulot, was much, was immense, was enough 
to make all the brilliant wits of Clamecy jealous. He 
took rank immediately among the famous jokers, and 
lawyer Page would no longer dare to speak to him so 
often of his hare changed into a rabbit. Who would 
dare to compare himself, in audacity and resources of 
imagination, with Benjamin Rathery, when once he 
had worked a miracle ? And who knows ? Perhaps 
the future generation would take the matter seriously. 
If he were to be canonized ; if they should make of his 
person a big saint of red wood ; if they should give him 
an office, a niche, a place in the almanac, an Ora pro 
nobis in the litanies ; if he should become the patron 
saint of a good parish ; if every year they should cele- 
brate his birthday with incense, crown him with flowers, 
decorate him Avith ribbons, and place a ripe grape in 
his hands ; if they should enshrine his red coat in a 
reliquary; if he should have a church- warden to wash 
his face every week ; if he should cure of the pest 
or of hydrophobia ! The only thing necessary Avas to 
carry out this miracle successfully ; if he had only seen 
a feAV performed! But hoAV should he go about it? 
And if he failed, he Avould be scoffed at, jeered, vilified, 
possibly beaten; he would lose all the glory of the 
hoax so well begun. . . . “ Oh ! nonsense ! ” said my 
uncle, pouring a large glass of wine for inspiration, 
“ Providence Avill provide ; Audaees fortuna juvat^ and 
besides, a miracle asked for is a miracle half performed.” 


78 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIN'. 


So lie followed tlie young peasant girl, dragging in 
his train, like a comet, a long tail of Moulotats ; having 
entered the house, he saw lying on the bed a peasant 
with his mouth askew, who seemed to be trying to eat 
his ear; he inquired how this accident had happened, 
and whether it was not the result of a yawn or an out- 
burst of laughter. 

“It happened this morning at breakfast,” answered 
his wife, “ as he was trying to break a walnut with his 
teeth.” 

“Very well,” said my uncle, his face lighting up, 
“ and did you call anybody ? ” 

“ We sent for M. Arnout, who declared that it was an 
attack of paralysis.” 

“ You could not have done better. I see that Doctor 
Arnout knows paralysis as well as if he had invented 
it ; and what did he prescribe ? ” 

“ The medicine in this vial.” 

My uncle, having examined the drug, saw that it was 
an emetic, and threw the vial into the street. His as- 
surance produced an excellent effect. 

“ I see clearly. Monsieur Jew,” said the good woman, 
“ that you are capable of performing the miracle that 
we ask of you.” 

“ Of such miracles as this,” answered Benjamin, “ I 
could work a hundred a day, if I were supplied with 
them.” 

He had them bring him an iron spoon, the handle 
of which he wound with several thicknesses of fine 
linen ; he introduced this improvised instrument into 
the patient’s mouth, raised the upper jaw, which was 
protruding over the lower jaw, and put it back in its 


MY UNCLE BENJAISHN. 


79 


place ; for the only disease from which this Moulotat 
suffered was a dislocated jaw, which my uncle, with his 
gray eye that penetrated everything, as if it were a nail, 
had perceived at once. The paralytic of the morning 
declared that he was completely cured, and he began 
to eat ravenously of a cabbage soup prepared for the 
family dinner. 

The report spread among the crowd with the rapidity 
of lightning that father Pintot was eating cabbage 
soup. The sick and all those whose forms nature had 
more or less altered implored my uncle’s protection. 
Mother Pintot, very proud to think that the miracle 
had been performed in her family, introduced to my 
uncle one of her cousins who had a left shoulder that 
looked like a ham, and asked him to reduce it ; but my 
uncle, who did not wish to compromise his reputation, 
answered that the best that he could do would be to 
pass the hump from the left shoulder to the right ; that 
moreover it was a very painful miracle, and that out of 
ten hump-backs of the common sort he had scarcely 
found two Avho had had the strength to endure it. 

Then he declared to the inhabitants of Moulot that 
he was grieved that he could not stay with them longer, 
but that he did not dare to keep the Holy Virgin wait- 
ing ; and he went to join his sister, who was warming 
her feet in the village tavern and had had time to have 
the ass fed. 

My uncle and my grandmother had the greatest dif- 
ficulty in the world in getting rid of the crowd, and the 
village bell was rung as long as they were in sight. 
My grandmother did not scold Benjamin ; after all, she 
was more pleased than vexed ; the way in which Benja- 


80 


MY UNCLE BENJA]NriN. 


min had extricated himself from this difficult situation 
flattered her pride as a sister, and she said that a man 
like Benjamin was Avell worth Mile. Minxit, even mth 
an income of two or three thousand francs thrown in. 

The description of the Wandering Jew and the Holy 
Virgin, and even that of the ass, had already reached 
La Chapelle. When they entered the town, the women 
were kneeling in their doorways, and Benjamin, who 
always knew what to do, gave them his blessing. 


CHAPTER YI. 

MONSIEUR MINXIT. 


Monsieur Minxit extended a very cordial welcome 
to my uncle and my grandmother. M. IMinxit was a 
doctor, I know not why. He had not spent the beauti- 
ful days of his youth in the society of corpses. The 
science of medicine had sprouted in his head one fine 
day, like a mushroom : if he knew medicine, it was 
because he had invented it. His parents had never 
dreamed of giving him a liberal education; all the 
Latin he knew was on his bottles, and even there, if he 
had depended on the labels, he would often have given 
parsley for hemlock. He had a very fine library, but 
he never poked his nose into his books. He said that, 
since his books were written, the temperament of man 
had changed. Some even pretended that all these 
precious works were only imitations of books made out 
of pasteboard, on the backs of which he had placed in 
gilt letters names celebrated in medicine. What con- 
firmed them in this opinion was that, whenever any 
one asked M. Minxit to let him see his library, he had 
lost the key. However, M. Minxit was a man of wit, 
he was endowed with a large share of intelligence, and, 
in default of printed knowledge, he had much knowl- 
edge of every-day life. As he knew nothing, he under- 
stood that to succeed he must persuade the multitude 
that he knew more than his rivals, and he made a spe- 
cialty of the divination of urines. After twenty years’ 


82 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


study of this science, he had succeeded in distinguish- 
ing: those that were turbid from those that were clear, 
wliich did not prevent him from telling every one who 
came to him that he could tell a great man, a king, or a 
cabinet minister, by his urine. As there were no kings, 
or cabinet ministers, or great men, in the vicinity, he 
did not fear that any one would take him at his word. 

M. Minxit had an incisive manner. He talked loud, 
a great deal, and incessantly; he divined those words 
which are likely to have an effect on peasants and knew 
how to make them prominent in his phrases. He had 
the faculty of deceiving the multitude, a faculty which 
consists of I know not what impalpable quality, impos- 
sible to describe, teach, or counterfeit ; an inexplicable 
faculty by which a simple operator causes a shower of 
pennies to fall into his cash-box, and by which the great 
man wins battles and founds empires ; a faculty which 
in some has taken the place of genius, which Napoleon 
of all men possessed in a supreme degree, and which in 
all cases I call simply charlatanism. It is not my fault 
if the instrument with which they sell Swiss tea is the 
same as that with which they build a throne. Through- 
out the neighborhood no one was willing to die except 
by the hand of M. Minxit. The latter, however, did 
not abuse this privilege ; he was no more of a murderer 
than h.m rivals, only he made more money with his vials 
of many eolors than they did with their aphorisms. He 
had acquired a ver}^ handsome fortune, and had, more- 
over, the faculty of spending his money to the purpose ; 
he seemed to give everything as if it had cost him 
nothing, and the clients that came to him always found 
open table at his house. 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


83 


For the rest my uncle and INI. Minxit were bound to 
be friends as soon as they should meet. These two 
natures resembled each other exactly; they were as 
near alike as two drops of wine or, to use an expression 
less offensive to my uncle, as two spoons cast in the 
same mould. They had the same appetites, the same 
tastes, the same passions, the same way of looking at 
things, the same political opinions. . Both concerned 
themselves little about those thousand little accidents, 
those thousand microscopic catastrophes, which the rest 
of us, fools that we are, consider as great misfortunes. 
He who has no philosophy amid the miseries of this 
world is like a man bareheaded in a shower. The phi- 
losopher, on the contrary, has over his head a good um- 
brella, which shelters him from the storm. ' Such was 
their opinion. They regarded life as a farce, and they 
played their parts in it as gayly as possible. They had 
a sovereign contempt for those ill-advised people who 
make their life one long sob. They wished theirs to 
be a fit of laughter. Age had produced no difference 
between them, beyond a few wrinkles. They were like 
two trees of the same species, one of which is old and 
the other in the full vigor of its sap, but both of which 
are adorned with the same flowers and hear the same 
fruits. Consequently the future father-in-law had 
formed a prodigious friendship for his son-in-law, and 
the son-in-law professed for the father-in-law a high 
esteem, barring his vials. Nevertheless my uncle ac- 
cepted M. Minxit’s alliance only in self-defence, by an 
effort of reason and that he might not displease his dear 
sister. 

M. Minxit, because he loved Benjamin, found it very 


u 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


natural that he should be loved by his daughter. For 
every father, however good he may be, loves himself in 
the person of his children ; he regards them as beings 
who ought to contribute to his comfort ; if he chooses 
a son-in-law, he does so first largely for himself, and 
then a little for his daughter. When he is avaricious, 
he puts her into the hands of a miser ; when he is a 
noble, he welds her to an escutcheon ; if he is fond 
of chess, he gives her to a chess-player, for he must 
have some one to play with him in his old age. His 
daughter is an undivided property which he possesses 
with his wife. Whether the property is enclosed by a 
flowering hedge or by a great ugly wall built of dry 
stones, whether it is made to produce roses or rape- 
seed, that does not concern her. She has no advice to 
give to the experienced agriculturist who cultivates 
her. She is unskilled in selecting the seed best suited 
to her. Provided these good parents in their soul and 
conscience find their daughter happy, that is enough. 
It is for her to accommodate herself to her condition. 
Every night the wife when making her curl papers and 
the good man when putting on his nightcap congratu- 
late themselves on having married their child so well. 
She does not love her husband, but she Avill accustom 
herself to love him : with patience one can accomplish 
anything. They do not know what it is to a woman 
to have a husband that she does not love. It is like a 
burning cinder that eannot be expelled from the eye, 
or a toothache that does not give one a moment’s rest. 
Some allow themselYes to die in pain ; others go else- 
where in search of the love which they cannot procure 
with the corpse to which they have been attached. 


UNCLE BENJAlVnN. 


85 


The latter gently slip into their fortunate husband’s 
soup a pinch of arsenic, and have it inscribed upon his 
tombstone that he leaves an inconsolable widow. Such 
is the result of the pretended infallibility and the dis- 
guised egoism of the good parents. 

If a young girl wanted to marry a monkey who had 
been naturalized as a man and a Frenchman, the father 
and mother would not willingly consent, and it cer- 
tainly would be necessary for the jocko to serve on 
them the required legal papers. You say: Those are 
good parents ; they do not wish their daughter to make 
herself unhappy. But I say : Those are detestable 
egoists. Nothing is more ridiculous than to put your 
way of feeling in the place of another’s : it is like try- 
ing to substitute your organization for his; Such a 
man wishes to die; he probably has good reasons for 
that. This young girl wishes to marry a monkey; 
she probably prefers a monkey to a man. Why refuse 
her the faculty of being happy in her own way ? If she 
thinks herself happy, who has a right to maintain 
that she is not? This monkey will scratch her in 
caressing her. What’s that to you? She probably 
would rather be scratched than caressed. Besides, if 
her husband scratches her, it is not her mamma’s cheek 
that will bleed. Who disapproves the dragon-fly of 
the marshes for hovering over the reeds rather than 
among the garden rose-bushes? Does the pike re- 
proach the eel, its god-mother, for staying continually 
in the mud at the bottom, instead of rising to the flow- 
ing water which ripples at the surface of the river ? 

Do you know why these good parents refuse their 
blessing to their daughter and her jocko ? The father 


86 


]MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


refuses because he desires a son-in-law who can be a 
voter, and with whom he can talk literature or politics ; 
the mother refuses because she needs a handsome young 
man to give her his arm, take her to the play, and go to 
walk with her. 

M. Minxit, after having uncorked some of his best 
bottles with Benjamin, took him into his house, into 
his cellar, into his barn, into his stables ; he walked 
him through his garden, and forced him to make the 
circuit of a large meadow watered by a living spring 
and planted with trees, which stretched away in the 
rear of the house and at the end of which the stream 
formed a fish-pond. All this was very desirable; un- 
happily fortune gives nothing for nothing, and in ex- 
change for all this comfort it was necessary to marry 
Mile. Minxit. 

After all. Mile. Minxit was as good as another ; she 
was only two inches too tall ; she was neither dark nor 
light, nor blonde nor red, nor stupid nor witty. She was 
a woman like twenty-five out of every thirty. She knew 
how to talk very pertinently of a thousand insignificant 
little things, and she made very good cream cheeses. 
It was much less against her than against marriage 
in general that my uncle rebelled, and if at the very 
first she had displeased him, it was because he had 
regarded her in the form of a heavy chain. 

“There is my estate,” said M. Minxit; “when you 
shall be my son-in-law, it will be ours, and indeed, 
when I am no longer here ”... 

“ Let us understand each other,” said my uncle, “ are 
you very sure that Mile. Arabelle is not at all reluctant 
to marry me?” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


87 


And why should she he? You do not do justice to 
yourself, Benjamin. Are you not the handsomest of 
young fellows, are you not amiable when you like and 
as much as you like, and are you not a man of wit in 
the bargain? ” 

“ There is some truth in what you say, M. Minxit, 
but women are capricious, and I have allowed myself to 
say>that ^Ille. Arabelle had an inclination for a gentle- 
man of this neighborhood, a certain de PontrCassd.” 

“ A country squire,” said M. Minxit, “ a sort of mus- 
keteer who has squandered on fine horses and embroid- 
ered coats the fine domains that his father left him. 
He has, in truth, asked me for Arabelle, but I rejected 
his proposal most decidedly. In less than two years he 
would have devoured my fortune. You can see that I 
could not give my daughter to such a being. Besides, 
he is a furious duellist. By way of compensation, one 
of these days he would have rid Arabelle of his noble 
person.” 

“ You are right, M. Minxit, but then, if this being is 
loved by Arabelle ”... 

“Nonsense, Benjamin! Arabelle has in her veins 
too much of my blood to be smitten with a viscount. 
What I need is a child of the people, a man like you, 
Benjamin, with whom I can laugh, drink, and philoso- 
phize ; a shrewd physician to exploit my clients with 
me and to supjily by his science what the divination of 
urines may fail to reveal to us.” 

“ One moment,” said my uncle, “ I warn you. Mon- 
sieur Minxit, that I will not consult urines.” 

“And why. Monsieur, do you not wish to consult 
urines? Come, Benjamin, he was a very sensible man. 


88 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


that emperor who said to his son : ‘Do these gold pieces 
smell of urine ? ’ If you knew how much presence of 
mind, imagination, perspicacity, and even logic are 
required for the consultation of urines, you would not 
want to follow any other profession all your life long ; 
perhaps you will he called a charlatan, but what is a 
charlatan ? A man who has more wit than the multi- 
tude ; and I ask you, is it from lack of desire or lack 
of wit that most doctors do not impose upon their 
patients ? Stay, there comes my fifer, probably to an- 
nounce the arrival of some vial. I am going to give 
you a sample of my art.” 

“Well, fifer,” said M. Minxit to the musician, 
“ what’s ne w ? ” 

“ A peasant has come to consult you,” he answered. 

“ And has Arabelle made him talk ? ” 

“Yes, Monsieur Minxit; he brings you his wife’s 
urine, she having fallen on a flight of steps and rolled 
down four or five of them. Mile. Arabelle doesn’t 
remember the exact number.” 

“ The devil I ” said M. Minxit, “ that is very stupid 
on Arabelle’s part; all the same, I will remedy that. 
Benjamin, go wait for me in the kitchen with the 
peasant; you shall know what a doctor who consults 
urines is.” 

M. Minxit entered his house through the little garden 
door, and five minutes afterward came into the kitchen 
Avith an harassed and over-fatigued air, holding a riding- 
Avhip in his hand and Avearing a cloak splashed up to 
the collar. 

“ Oh ! ” said he, throAving himself upon a chair, 
“ what abominable roads ! I am Avorn out ; I have trav- 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


89 


elled more than fifteen leagues this morning ; take off 
my boots immediately and warm my bed.” 

“ Monsieur Minxit, I beg of you ! ” said the peasant, 
presenting his vial. 

“To the devil,” said M. Minxit, “with your vial; 
yon see well enough that I can do no more. That’s 
just like yon all ; yon always come to consult me just as 
I come in from the country.” 

“My father,” said Arabelle, “this man too is tired; 
do not force him to come again to-morrow.” 

“Well, let me see the vial then,” said M. Minxit, 
with an air of extreme vexation ; and approaching the 
window, he added : “ This is your wife’s urine, isn’t 
it?” 

“You are right. Monsieur Minxit,” said the peasant. 

“ She has had a fall,” added the doctor, examining the 
vial again. 

“ You could not have divined more accurately.” 

“ On a flight of steps, was it not ? ” 

“ Why, you are a sorcerer. Monsieur Minxit.” 

“ And she rolled down four qf them.” 

“This time you are wrong. Monsieur Minxit; she 
rolled down five.” 

“Nonsense, it is impossible; go count your flight of 
steps again, and you Avill see that there are only four 
in all.” 

“ I assure you, Monsieur, that there are five, and that 
she did not miss a single one.” 

“It is astonishing,” said M. Minxit, examining the 
vial again ; “ there certainly are but four steps in this. 
By the way, did you bring me all the urine that your 
wife gave you ? ” 


90 


MY UNCLE BENJA]SIIN. 


“ I threw a little on the ground, because -the vial was 
too full.” 

“ I am no longer surprised that I d: d not find the full 
number ; ‘ that is the cause of the deficit: it was the 
fifth step that you poured out, you stupid fellow ! So 
we will treat your wife as having rolled down a flight 
of five steps.” 

And he gave the peasant five or six little packages 
and as many vials, all labelled in Latin. 

“ I should have thought,” said my uncle, “ that you 
would first have practised an abundant bleeding.” 

“ If it had been a fall from a horse, a fall from a tree, 
or a fall in the road, yes ; but a fall on a flight of steps 
should always be treated in this way.” 

After the peasant came a young girl. 

“ Well ! how is your mother? ” asked tlie doctor. 

“ Much better. Monsieur Minxit ; but she cannot re- 
gain her strength, and I came to ask you what she 
should do.” 

‘‘ You ask me what she must do, and I will bet that 
you haven’t a sou with which to buy medicines ! ” 

“ Alas 1 no, my good Monsieur Minxit, for my father 
has had no work for a week.” 

“ Then why the devil does your mother take it into 
her head to be sick ? ” 

“ Rest easy. Monsieur Minxit ; as soon as my father 
gets work, you will be paid for your visits ; he charged 
me to tell you so.” 

“ Indeed ! more nonsense ! Is your father mad that 
he expects to pay me for my visits wdien he has no 
bread? For what does your imbecile of a father take 
me? You will go this evening with your ass to get 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAT^UN. 


91 


a sack of wheat at my mill, and you will carry away 
Avith you from here a basket of old wine and a quarter 
of mutton ; that is what your mother immediately needs. 
If her strength does not return Avithin tAvo or three 
days, you Avill let me knoAV. Noav go, my child.” 

“ Well I ” said M. Minxit to Benjamin, ‘‘what do you 
think of the practice of medicine by the consultation of 
urines ? ” 

“ You are a brave and Avorthy man. Monsieur Minxit ; 
that is your excuse ; but, the devil ! you Avill never get 
me to treat a patient Avho has fallen doAvn stairs other- 
wise than by bleeding.” 

“ Then you are only a raAv recruit in medicine ; are 
you not aAvare that peasants must have drugs ? , Other- 
AAuse they think that you are neglecting them. W ell, 
then, you shall not consult urines ; but it’s a pity, for 
you Avould have been a famous hand at it.” 


CHAPTER YIL 

TABLE TALK AT M. MINXIt’s. 

The dinner-liour arrived. Although M. Minxit had 
invited but a few persons besides those known to us, — • 
the priest, the tabellion, and one of liis confreres in the 
neighborhood, — the table was loaded down with a pro- 
fusion of ducks and chickens, some lying in stately in- 
tegrity in the midst of their sauce, others symmetrically 
spreading their disjointed members on the ellipsis of 
their platter. The wine, for the rest, was from a certain 
hillside of Trucy, whose vines, in spite of the levelling 
which has passed over our vineyards as over our society, 
have maintained their aristocracy, and still enjoy a de- 
served reputation. 

“ Brit,” said my uncle to M. Minxit, at sight of this 
Homeric abundance, “you have a rvhole poultry-yard 
here. There is enough to satisfy a company of dragoons 
after field-day exercises. Or perhaps you expect our 
friend Arthus?” 

“ In that case I would have spitted one fowl more,” 
answered M. Minxit, laughing. “But if we do not suc- 
ceed in disposing of all this, it will be easy to find 
people to finish our task ; and my officers, — that is, my 
musicians, — and the clients who will come to me to- 
morrow with their vials, have I not to think of them ? 
I adopt it as a principle that he who has dinner prepared 
only for himself is not fit to dine.” 

“ It is just,” replied my uncle. And after this phil- 


]\IY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


98 


(5sopliical reflection, he began to attack M. Minxit’s 
chickens as if he had a personal spite against them. 

The guests were suited to each other. For that mat- 
ter, my uncle was suited to everybody, and everybody 
was suited to him. They enjoyed frankly and very 
• noisily IM. Minxit’s copious hospitality. “ Fifer,” said 
the latter to one of the table-waiters, “bring in the 
Burgundy, and tell the musicians to come hither with 
arms and baggage ; those who are drunk are not ex- 
empt.” The musicians came in at once and arranged 
themselves around the room. M. IMinxit, having un- 
corked a few bottles of Burgundy, solemnly lifted his 
full glass, and said : “ Gentlemen, to the health of M. 
Benjamin Rathery, the first doctor of the bailiwick ; I 
present him to you as my son-in-law, and pray you to 
love him as you love me. Let the music play.” Then 
an infernal noise of bass drum, triangle, cymbals, and 
clarinette burst forth in the dining room, and my uncle 
was obliged to ask mercy for the guests. This an- 
nouncement, a little too official and premature, caused 
Mile. Minxit to sulk and make wry faces. Benjamin, 
who had something else to do than criticise what was 
going on around him, noticed nothing; but this mark 
of repugnance did not escape my grandmother. Her 
pride was deeply wounded ; for, if Benjamin was not to 
everybody the handsomest young fellow in dhe country, 
he was such at least to his sister. After having thanked 
M. Minxit for the honor that he did her brother, she 
added, biting each syllable as if she had the poor Ara- 
belle between her teeth, that the principal, the only 
reason that had determined Benjamin to solicit M. 
Minxit’s alliance was the lofty consideration enjoyed 
by M. Minxit in all the country round. 


7 


94 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


Benjamin, thinking that his sister had made a mess 
of it, hastened to add : “ And also the graces and 
charms of every sort with which Mile. Arabelle is so 
abundantly provided, and which promise to the happy 
mortal who shall be her husband days spun of gold and 
silk.” Then, as if to quiet the remorse which this sad ‘ 
compliment caused him, — the only one that he had yet 
expended on Mile. Minxit and which his sister had 
obliged him to commit, — he began to furiously devour a 
chicken’s wing, and emptied a huge glass of Burgundy 
at one swallow. 

There were three doctors present ; they were bound 
to talk medicine, and they did. 

“You said just now, M. Minxit,” said Fata, “that 
your son-in-law was the first doctor of the bailiwick. 

I do not protest in my own behalf, — although I have 
made certain cures ; but what do you think of Doctor 
Arnout, of Clamecy ? ” 

“Ask Benjamin,” said M. Minxit; “he knows him 
better than I do.” 

“ Oh, M. Minxit,” answered my uncle, “a rival ! ” 

“ What difference does that make ? You do not need 
to depreciate your rivals, do you ? Tell us what you 
think of him, just to oblige Fata.” 

“ Since you insist, I think that Doctor Arnout wears 
a superb wig.” 

“And why,” said Fata, “is not a doctor who wears 
a wig as good as a doctor who wears a cue ? ” 

“ The question is the more delicate because you your- 
self wear a wig. Monsieur Fata. But I will try to 
explain myself without wounding the pride of anyone 
whomsoever. Here is a doctor who has his head full of 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


95 


knowledge, who has ransacked all the old medical 
books ever written, who knows from what Greek 
words come the five or six hundred diseases that afflict 
our poor humanity. W ell, if he has only a limited in- 
telligence, I would not like to trust him to cure my 
little finger ; I would give the preference to an intelli- 
gent mountebank, for his science is a lantern that is not 
lighted. It has been said: The value of the man 
measures the value of his land;’ it would be quite 
as true to say : The value of the man measures the 
value of his knowledge ; and that is especially true of 
medicine, which is a conjectural scieoce. There one 
must divine causes by equivocal and uncertain effects. 
The pulse that is dumb under the finger of a fool con- 
fides marvellous secrets to the man of wit. Two things 
above all are neceissary to success in medicine, and these 
two things are not to be acquired : they are perspicacity 
and intelligence.” 

“ You forget,” said M. Minxit, laughing, “ the cym> 
bals and the bass drum.” 

“ Oh,” said Benjamin, “ speaking of your bass drum, 
I have an excellent idea ; does there happen to be a 
vacancy in your orchestra ? ” 

“ For whom ? ” said M. Minxit. 

“ For an old sergeant of my acquaintance and a 
poodle,” answered Benjamin. ^ 

“ And on what instrument can your two lorotSijSs 
play?” 

“ I do not know,” said Benjamin ; “ probably on any 
instrument you like.” 

“ At any rate we can have your old sergeant groom 
my four horses until my music-master has familiarized 


96 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


him with some instrument or other, or else he shall 
pound my drugs.” 

“ By the way,” said my uncle, “ we can use him to 
still better advantage ; he has a face as brown as a 
chicken just from the spit; one would think that he 
had s^^ent his whole life in simply crossing and recross- 
ing the equator ; you would take him for the good man 
Tropic in person ; besides, he is as dry as an old burnt 
bone : we will give it out that from his body we ex- 
tracted the grease of which we make our j)omatum: 
that will sell better than bear’s grease ; or else we will 
pass him off for an old Nubian of one hundred and 
forty years, who has prolonged his days to this extraor- 
dinary age by the use of an elixir of long life, the 
secret of which he has transmitted to .us in considera- 
tion of a life pension. Now, we will sell this precious 
elixir for the mere bagatelle of fifteen sous a bottle. 
Then no one can afford to be without it.” 

“Thunder I” saidM. Minxit, “I see that you under- 
stand the practice of medicine on the grand orchestra 
plan ; send me your man as soon as you like ; I will 
take him into my service, whether as a Nubian or as a 
dried-up old man.” 

At this moment a domestic entered the dininor-room 
in a great fright, and told, my uncle that a score of 
women were tugging at his ass’s tail, and that, when he 
had tried to disperse them with a whip, they had come 
very near tearing him to pieces with their sharp finger- 
nails. 

“I see how it is,” said my uncle, bursting with 
laughter : “ they are pulling hairs from the Holy Vir- 
gin’s beast to keep as relics.” 


ISIY UKCLE BENJAMIN. 97 

M. Minxit asked for an explanation of tins allusion. 

“ Gentlemen,” he cried, when my uncle had finished 
his story, “ we are impious men if we do not worship 
Benjamin ; pastor, you must make a saint of him.” 

“ I protest,” said Benjamin ; “ I do not wish to go to 
Paradise, for I should not meet any of you there.” 

“Yes, laugh, gentlemen,” said my grandmother, after 
having laughed herself; “but that doesn’t make me 
laugh ; Benjamin’s practical jokes always end in some 
such way ; M. Durand will make us pay for his ass; 
unless we restore the animal as we received it.” 

“At any rate,” said my uncle, “he cannot make us 
pay for more than the tail. Would a man who had cut 
off my cue, — and my cue may surely be said, without 
flattering it, to be worth as much as the tail of M. 
Durand’s ass, — be as guilty in the eyes of justice as if 
he had killed me entirely ? ” 

“ Certainly not,” said M. Minxit, “ and if you want 
to know my opinion, I should not esteem you one obole 
less.” 

Meanwhile the yard was filling with women who 
maintained a respectful attitude, such as is maintained 
around a too small chapel in which divine service is in 
progress, and many of whom were kneeling. 

“You Avill have to rid us of these people,” said M. 
Minxit to Benjamin. 

“Nothing easier,” answered the latter; then. he went 
to the window and told the throng that they would 
have plenty of time to see the Holy Virgin, that she 
proposed to remain two days at M. Minxit’s, and that 
the next Sunday she would not fail to attend high mass. 
On the strength of this assurance the people withdreAV 
satisfied. 


98 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ Such parishioners,” said the priest, “ do me little 
honor : I must tell them so on Sunday in my sermon. 
How can any one be so limited in capacity as to take 
the dirty tail of an ass for a sacred object ? ” 

“But, pastor,” responded Benjamin, “you who are so 
philosophical at table, have you not in your church two 
or three bones as white as paper, which are under glass 
and which you call the relics of Saint IMaurice ? ” 

“ Those are exhausted relics,” said M. Minxit : “ it is 
more than fifty years since they worked miracles. My 
friend the priest would do well to get rid of them and 
sell them to be made into animal black. I would take 
them myself to make album graecum, if he would let 
me have them at a reasonable price.” 

“ What is album graecum ? ” asked my grandmother, 
innocently. 

“ Madame,” answered M. Minxit, with a bow, “it is 
Greek white : I regret that I cannot tell you more about 
it.” 

“ For my part,” said the tabellion, a little old man in 
a white wig, whose eye was full of mischief and vivac- 
ity, “I do not reproach the pastor for the honorable 
place which he has given in his church to the shin- 
bones of Saint Maurice: Saint Maurice undoubtedly 
had shin-bones when he was alive. Why should they 
not be here as well as anywhere ? I am even astonished 
at one thing, — that the vestry does not possess our 
patron saint’s Hessian boots. But I could wish that 
the pastor in his turn might be more tolerant and might 
not rebuke his parishioners for their faith in the -Wan- 
dering Jew. Not to believe enough is as sure a sign of 
ignorance as to believe too much.” 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


99 


“ What ! ” replied the priest quickly, “ you, Monsieur 
tahellion, you believe in the Wandering Jew? ” 

“ Why, then, should I not believe in him as well as 
in Saint Maurice ? ” 

“And you. Monsieur doctor,” said he, addressing 
Fata, “do you believe in the Wandering Jew?” 

“ Hum ! hum ! ” said the latter, taking a huge pinch 
of snuff. 

“ And you, respectable Monsieur Minxit ”... 

“I,” -interrupted M. Minxit, “agree with my con- 
frere, except that, instead of a pinch of snuff, I take a 
glass of wine.” 

“You, at least. Monsieur Rathery, who pass for a 
philosopher, I really hope that you do not honon the 
Wandering Jew with belief in his eternal peregrina- 
tions.” 

“ Why not ?”■ said my uncle; “you believe in Jesus 
Christ.” 

“Oh! that’s different,” ansAvered the priest, “I be- 
lieve in Jesus Christ because neither his existence nor 
his divinity can be called in question; because the 
evangelists who have Avritten his history are men 
Avorthy of faith ; because they could not have been mis- 
taken ; because they had no motive to deceive their 
neighbor, and because, even if they had desired it, the 
fraud could not have been carried out. 

“If the facts recorded by them were manufactured, if 
the Gospel AA^ere, like ‘ Tdl^maque,’ only a sort of philo- 
sophical and religious novel, on the appearance of 
that fatal book which Avas to spread trouble and division 
over the surface of the earth ; which Avas to separate 
husband from wife, children from their fathers ; which 


100 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


rehabilitated poverty ; which made the slave the equal 
of the master ; which conflicted with all received ideas ; 
which honored everything that up to that time had 
been received, and threw as rubbish into the Are of hell 
everything that had been honored; which overturned 
the old religion of the Pagans, and on its ruins estab- 
lished, in the place of altars, the gibbet of a poor car- 
penter’s son ”... 

“Monsieur priest,” said M. Minxit, “your period is 
too long ; you must cut it with a glass of wine.” 

The priest, having di’unk a glass of wine, continued : 

“ On the appearance of that book, I say, the Pagans 
would have uttered an immense cry of protest, and the 
Jews, whom it accused of the greatest crime that a 
people can commit, a deicide, would have followed it 
with their eternal denunciations.” 

“But,” said my uncle, “the Wandering Jew is sup- 
ported by an authority no less powerful than that of 
the Gospel, — the lament of the bourgeois of Brussels in 
Brabant, who met him at the gates of the city and 
regaled him with a pot of fresh beer. 

“The evangelists are men worthy of faith ; grant it. 
But in fact, inspiration aside, what were these evangel- 
ists ? Tramps, men who had neither fire nor shelter, 
who paid no taxes, and whom the authorities to-day 
would prosecute as vagabonds. The bourgeois of Brus- 
sels, on the contrary, were established men, house- 
holders; several, I am sure^ were syndics or church- 
wardens. If the evangelists and the Brussels bourgeois 
could have a discussion before the bailiff, I am very sure 
that the magistrate would defer to the oath of the 
Brussels bourgeois. 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


101 


“Tlie Brussels bourgeois could not have been mis- 
taken ; for a bourgeois is not a puppet, a man of ginger- 
bread,' and it is no more difficult to distinguish a man 
over seventeen hundred years old from a modern than 
to distinguish an ordinary old man from a child of five. 

‘‘ The Brussels bourgeois had no motive to deceive 
their fellow-citizens : it was of little importance to 
them whether there was or was not a man who travels 
on forever; and what honor could they derive from 
sitting at table in a brewery with the superlative of 
vagabonds, with one of the damned, so to speak, a hun- 
dred times more despicable than a galley-slave, to 
whom I myself would not like to take off my hat, and 
from having drunk fresh beer with him ? Arid, looking 
at the matter rightly, they even acted, in publishing 
their lament, rather against their interest than for it ; 
for that bit of poetry is not calculated to give a high 
opinion of their poetic value. And the tailor Millot- 
Rataut, whose ‘ Grand Noel ’ I have many a time sur- 
prised around a bit of Brie cheese, is a Virgil in com- 
parison with them. 

“ The Brussels bourgeois could not have deceived their 
fellow-citizens, even had they wished to do so. If the 
facts celebrated in their lament were manufactured, on 
the appearance ,of that document the inhabitants of 
Brussels would have protested ; the police would have 
consulted their registers to see ’if a certain Isaac Laque- 
dem had spent such a day in Brussels, and they would 
have protested. The shoemakers, whose venerable 
brotherhood has been forever dishonored by the brutal 
conduct of the Wandering Jew, himself a knight of the 
awl, would not have failed to protest ; in short, there 


102 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


would have been a concert of protests sufficient to 
crumble the towers of the capital of Brabant. 

“ Besides, in the matter of credibility, the lament of 
the Wandering Jew has notable advantages over the 
Gosx)el ; it did not fall from heaven like a meteoric 
stone; it has a precise date. The first copy was de- 
posited in the royal library, well and duly signed with 
the name of the printer and the street and number 
of his domicile. The lament of Brussels is accom- 
panied by a portrait of the Wandering Jew in a three- 
cornered hat, polonaise coat, Hessian boots, and carry- 
ing a huge cane ; no medallion, however, has come 
down to us bearing the effigy of Jesus Christ. The 
lament of the Wandering JeAv was written in an en- 
lightened, investigating century, more disposed to 
shorten its creed than to lengthen it ; the Gospel, on 
the contrary, appeared suddenly like a torch, lighted 
no one knows by whom, amid the darkness of a century 
given over to gross superstitions, and among a people 
plunged in the deepest ignorance, and whose history is 
only a long series of acts of superstition and bar- 
barism.” 

“ Permit me. Monsieur Benjamin,” said the notary ; 
“ you have said that the Briissels bourgeois could not 
have been mistaken as to the identity of the Wandering 
Jew; yet the inhabitants of Moulot took you this morn- 
ing for the Wandering Jew; you yourself, in that ca- 
pacity, have worked an authentic miracle in presence 
of the entire people of Moulot; your demonstration 
fails therefore in one point, and your rules regarding 
historical certainty are not infallible.” 

“ The objection is a strong one,” said Benjamin, 


MY UKCLE BENJAJNIIX. 


103 


scratching his head ; “ I admit that it is impossible for 
me to answer it; hut it applies as well to Monsieur’s 
Jesus Christ as to my Wandering Jew.” 

‘‘But,” interrupted my grandmother, who alv/ays 
wanted to come down to facts, “ I hope that you believe 
in Jesus Christ, Benjamin?” 

“ Undoubtedly, my dear sister, I believe in Jesus 
Christ. I believe in him the more firmly because v/ith- 
out believing in the divinity of Jesus Christ one cannot 
believe in the existence of God, as the only 2:)roofs of 
the existence of God are the miracles of J esus Christ. 
But then that does not prevent me from believing in 
the Wandering Jew, or, to explain myself more clearly, 
shall I tell you how I view the Wandering Jew? 

“The Wandering Jew is the effigy of the Jewish 
people, sketched by some unknown poet of the peojJe, 
on the walls of a cottage. This myth is so striking that 
only a blind man could fail to recognize it. 

“The Wandering Jew has no roof, no fireside, no 
legal and political domicile : the J ewish people have no 
country. 

“ The Wandering Jew is obliged to travel on without 
rest, without stopping, without taking breath, which 
must be very fatiguing to him with his Hessian boots. 
He has already been seven times around the world. 
The Jewish people are not firmly established anywhere ; 
everywhere they live in tents ; they go and come in- 
cessantly like the waves of the ocean, and they too, like 
foam floating on the surface of the nations, like a straw 
borne by the current of civilization, have already been 
many times around the world. 

“The Wandering Jew always has five sous in his 


104 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


pocket. The Jewish people, continually ruined by the 
exactions of the feudal nobility and by the confiscations 
of the kings, always came back to a prosperous condi- 
tion, as a cork reascends from the bottom to the surface 
of the water. Their wealth sprang up of itself. 

“The Wandering Jew can spend only five sous at 
a time. The Jewish people, obliged to conceal their 
wealth, have become stingy and parsimonious ; they 
spend little. 

“The torment of the Wandering Jew will last for- 
ever. The Jewish people can no more reunite as a 
national body than the ashes of an oak struck by light- 
ning can reunite as a tree. They are scattered over the 
surface of the earth until the centuries shall be no more. 

“To speak seriously, it is doubtless a superstition to 
believe in the Wandering Jew,' but I will say to you as 
it is said in the Gospel : let him who is free from all 
superstition cast the first sarcasm at the inhabitants of 
Moulot. The fact is that we are all superstitious, some 
more, others less, and often he who has a wen on his 
ear as big as a potato makes sport of him who has a 
wart on his chin. 

“ There are not two Christians who have the same 
beliefs, who admit and reject the same things. One 
fasts on Friday and does not go to church on Sunday; 
another goes to church on Sunday and eats meat on Fri- 
day. This lady mocks at Friday and Sunday alike, and 
would consider herself damned if she should be married 
outside of a church. 

“Let religion be a beast with seven horns. He 
who believes only in six of its horns mocks at him who 
believes in the seventh ; he who grants it but five horns 


105 


m 

MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 

mocks at him who recognizes six. Then comes the 
deist who mocks at all who believe that religion has 
horns, and finally passes the atheist who mocks at all 
the others, and yet the atheist believes in Cagliostro 
and consults the fortune-tellers. In short, there is 
only one man who is not superstitious, — namely, he 
who believes only in that which is demonstrated.” 

It was dark and more than dark when my grand- 
mother declared that she wished to start. 

“ I will let Benjamin go only on one condition,” said 
M. Minxit, “that he promises me to take part on Sun- 
day in a grand hunting party which I decree in his 
honor: he must become familiar with his woods and 
the hares within them.” 

“ But,” said my uncle, “ I do not know the first ele- 
ments of hunting. I could readily distinguish a hare 
stew from a stewed rabbit, but may Millot-Rataut sing 
me his ‘ Grand Noel ’ if I am capable of distinguishing a 
hare on the run from a running rabbit.” 

“ So much the worse for you, my friend ; but that is 
one reason more why you should come : one should 
know a little of everything.” 

“ You will see. Monsieur Minxit, that I shall do some- 
thing awful; I shall kill one of your musicians.” 

“ Oh ! be careful not to do that, at least ; I should 
have to pay his bereaved family more than he is worth. 
But, to avoid any accident, you shall hunt with your 
sword.” 

“Well, I promise,” said my uncle. 

And thereupon he took his leave of M. Minxit, accom- 
panied by his dear sister. 

“ Do you know,” said Benjamin to my grandmother 


106 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


when tliey were on their way home, “ that I would 
rather marry M. Minxit than his daughter?” 

“ One should desire only what he can have, and 
whatever one can have he should desire,” answered 
my graiivlmother, dryly. 

But ”... 

‘‘ But . . . look out for the ass, and do not prick 
him with your sv,mrd, as you did this morning ; that is 
all I ash of you.” 

“You are out of sorts, iny sister; I should like to 
know wliy.” 

“Well, I will tell you: ] because you dnank too much, 
debated too much, and did not say a word to Mile. 
Arabelle. Now, leave me in peace.” 


CHAPTER YIIL 


nOAV MY UNCLE KISSED A MARQUIS. . 

The following Saturday my uncle slept at Corvol. 

They started the next morning at sunrise. M. 
Minxit was accompanied by all his people and several 
friends, among whom was his confrere Fata. It was 
one of those splendid days that gloomy winter, like a 
smiling jailer, occasionally gives the earth; February 
seemed to have borrowed its sun from the month of 
April ; the sky was clear, and the South wind filled the 
atmosphere with a soft warmth ; the river was steaming 
in the distance among the willows ; the white frost of 
the morning hung in little drops from the branches of 
the hushes ; the little shepherds were singing in the 
meadows for the first time in the year, and the brooks 
that ran down the mountain of Flez, awakened by the 
warmth of the sun, babbled at the foot of the hedges. 

“ Monsieur Fata,” said my uncle, “ this is a fine day. 
Shall we pass under the wet branches of the woods ? ” 

“ I don’t care to, my confrere,” said the latter. “ If 
you will come to my house, I will show you a four- 
headed child which I have sealed in a bottle. M. 
Minxit offers me three hundred francs for it.” 

“ You will do well to let him have it,” said my uncle, 
“ and ]3ut some currant wine in its place.” 

Nevertheless, as he had a good pair of legs, and as it 
was only two short leagues from there to Yarzy, he 
decided to follow his confrere. So Fata and he left the 


108 


MY UNCLE BENJAlSriN. 


main body of the huntsmen, and plunged into a cross- 
path that ran through the meadow. Soon they found 
themselves opposite Saint-Pierre du Mont. Now, Saint- 
Pierre du Mont is a big hill situated on the road from 
Clamecy to Varzy. At its base it is surrounded with 
meadows and' streaming with water-courses, but at its 
summit it is shorn and bare. You would take it for a 
huge ball of earth raised on the plain by a gigantic 
mole. On its bare and scurvy cranium there was then 
the remnant of a feudal castle ; to-day that is rerjlaced 
by an. elegant country-house, in which a cattle-raiser 
lives, for thus it is that the works of man, like those of 
nature, insensibly decompose and recoinpose. 

The walls of the castle were dismantled and its bat- 
tlements toothless in many spots ; the towers seemed to 
have been broken off in the middle, and they were 
reduced to the condition of trunks; its moats, half 
dried up, were encumbered by tall grasses and a forest 
of reeds, and its drawbridge had given place to a stone 
bridge ; the sinister shadow of this old feudal ruin sad- 
dened the entire neighborhood ; the cottages had moved 
back from it : some had gone to the neighboring hill to 
form the village of Flez, while others had gone down 
into the valley and grouped themselves as a hamlet 
along the road. 

The master of this old establishment at that time was 
a certain Marquis de Cambyse. ]\I. de Cambyse was 
tall, stout, heavily built, and had a giant’s strength. 
You would have thought him an old suit of armour 
made of flesh. He was of a violent, passionate, exces- 
sively irascible nature, and was moreover spoiled by his 
nobility, and imagined that the Cambyse family was a 
•work unparalleled in creation, 


MY UJiTCLE BENJAMIUT. 


109 


At one time lie had been an officer of musketeers, of 
I know not what color ; hut he was ill at ease at court, 
his will there was repressed, his violence could not give 
itself vent, and moreover he was stifled amid that dust 
of country squires which sparkled and whirled around 
the throne. He had returned to his estate, and lived 
there like a little monarch. Time had taken away one 
by one the old privileges of the nobility; but he had 
actually kept them, and exercised them to the full. He 
was still absolute master, not only of his domains, but 
also of all the country round about. Barring the 
buckler, he was a veritable feudal lord. He cudgelled 
the peasants, took their wives from them when they 
were pretty, invaded their lands with his hounds, tram- 
pled their crops under the feet of his lixlets^ and sub- 
jected to a thousand annoyances, the bourgeois who 
allowed themselves to meet him in the vicinity of his 
mountain. 

He practised despotism and violence from caprice, for 
entertainment, and especially through pride. In order 
to be the most eminent personage in the vicinity, he 
wished to be the wickedest. He knew no better way of 
showing his superiority to people than to oppress them. 
To be famous he made himself wicked. Except in size, 
he was like the flea who cannot make you aware of his 
presence among your bed-clothes except by pricking 
you. Although rich, he had creditors. But he made it 
a point of honor not to pay them. Such was the terror 
of his name that you could not have found a sheriff’s 
officer in the country willing, to serve a paper on him. 
A single one, father Ballivet, had dared to serve a writ 
on him with his own hand and speaking in his own 


no 


MY UNCLE BENJAINUN. 


person, but he had risked his life in doing it. Honor 
then to generous father Ballivetj the royal process- 
server, who served writs everywhere and two leagues 
beyond, as the wags of the neighborhood said in order 
to dim the glory of this great process-server. 

This was how he managed it. Ha wrapped his docu- 
ment in a half-dozen envelopes treacherously sealed, and 
presented it to M. de Cambyse as a package coming 
from the castle of Yilaine. While the Marquis Avas 
unwrapping the document, he ran away noiselessly, 
reached the main gate, and mounted his horse, Avhich 
he had fastened to a tree at some distance from the 
castle. When the Marquis found out what the pack- 
age contained, furious at having been the dupe of a 
process-server, he ordered his domestics to folloAv in his 
tracks ; but father B alii vet was beyond their reach, and 
mocked at them with a gesture which I cannot repro- 
duce here. 

Moreover, M. de Cambyse felt sca^rcely greater scru- 
ple about discharging his gun at a peasant than at a fox. 
He had already maimed tAvo or three, Avho Avere knoAvn 
in the neighborhood as the cripples of M. de Cambyse, 
and several quasi-notable inhabitants of Clamecy had 
been the victims of his Avicked practical jokes. Although 
he Avas not yet very old, there had already been in the 
life of this honorable lord enough bloody tricks to en- 
title him to tAvo life-sentences ; but his family stood 
Avell at court, and the protection of his noble relatives 
secured him against prosecution. And in fact-cach one 
takes his pleasure Avhere he finds it. The good King 
Louis XV., while engaged in such gentle and merry 
sports at Versailles, and Avhile giving parties to the 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


Ill 


gentlemen of his court, did not wish his gentlemen in 
the provinces to grow weary on their estates, and he 
would have been very much vexed had there been any 
lack of peasants for them to whip until they howled or 
of bourgeois for them to insult. Louis, called the WelL 
Beloved, was determined to deserve the love that his 
subjects had awarded him. So then it is understood 
that the Marquis de Cambyse was as inviolable as a 
constitutional king, and that for him there was neither 
justice nor marshalsea. 

Benjamin was fond of declaiming against M. de 
Cambyse. He called him the Gessler of the neighbor- 
hood, and had often manifested a desire to find himself 
face to face with this man. His wishes were fulfilled 
only too soon, as you will noAV see. 

My uncle, in his capacity of philosopher, stood in' 
contemplation before the old battlements, black and 
notched, that rent the azure of the sky. 

“ Monsieur Bathery,” said his confrere to him, pull- 
ing him by the sleeve, “ it does no one any good to stay 
around this castle, I warn you.” 

“What, Monsieur Fata, you too are afraid of a Mar- 
quis ? ” 

“ But, Monsieur Bathery, you knoAV I am a doctor 
with a wig.” 

“ That’s the way with all of them ! ” cried my uncle, 
giving free course to his indignatioli ; “ there are three 
hundred common people against one gentleman, and 
they allow the gentleman to Avalk over their bellies. 
Furthermore, they flatten themselves as much as they 
can for fear this noble personage may stumble ! ” 

“ What do you expect, M. Bathery, against force ? ” 


112 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ But it is you who liave the force, poor fellow I 
You resemble the ox who lets a child lead him from 
his green meadow to the slaughter-house. Oh, the 
people are cowards, cowards ! I say it with bitterness, 
as a mother says that her child has a wicked heart. 
They always abandon to the executioner those who 
have sacrificed themselves for them, and, if a rope is 
lacking with Avhich to hang them, they undertake to 
furnish it. Tavo thousand years have passed over the 
ashes of the Gracchi, and seventeen hundred and fifty 
years over the gibbet of Jesus Christ, and they are still 
the same people. They sometimes have spurts of cour- 
age, and fire issues from their mouths and nostrils ; 
but slavery is their normal condition, and they ahvays 
return to it, as a tamed canary always returns to 
'its cage. You Avatch the passing of the torrent 
SAVollen by a sudden storm, and you take it for a 
river. You pass again the next day, and you find noth- 
ing but a sheepish thread of Avater hiding under the 
grasses of its banks, and Avhich has left, from its pas- 
sage of the day before, only a fcAv straws on the 
branches of the bushes. They are strong Avhen they 
wish to be ; but look out, their strength lasts only a 
moment : those Avho rely upon them build their house 
upon the icy surface of a lake.” 

Just at that moment a man dressed in a rich hunting 
costume crossed the road, folloAved by barking dogs and 
a long train of valets. Fata turned pale. 

“ M. de Cambyse,” said he to my uncle ; and he 
boAved profoundly ; but Benjamin stood straight and 
covered like a Spanish grandee. 

' Now, nothing Avas more calculated to offend the terri- 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


113 


ble Marquis than the j^resumption of this villein who 
refused him the ordinary homage on the verge of his 
domains and in front of his castle. It was, moreover, 
a very bad example, which might become contagious. 

“ Clodhopper,” said he to my uncle, with his gentle- 
man’s air, “ why do you not salute me ? ” 

“ And you,” answered my uncle, surveying him from 
head to foot with his gray eye, “why did you not 
salute me ? ” 

“Do you not know that I am the Marquis de Cam- 
byse, lord of all this country ? ” 

“ And are you ignorant of the fact that I am Benja- 
min Rathery, doctor of medicine, of Clamecy ? ” 

“ Really,” said the Marquis, “ so you are a saw- 
bones ? I congratulate you upon it ; it is a fine title 
that you have.” 

“ It is as good a title as yours ! To acquire it, I had 
to follow long and serious studies. But what did that 
de which you put before your name cost you ? The 
king can make twenty marquises a day, but I defy 
him, with all his power, to make a doctor ; a doctor has 
his usefulness ; later perhaps you will recognize it ; 
but what is a marquis good for?” 

The Marquis de Cambyse had breakfasted well that 
morning. He was in good humor. 

“Well,” said he to his steward, “this is an original 
wag ; I would rather have met him. than a deer. And 
this one,” he added, pointing his finger at Fata, “who 
is he?” 

“M. Fata, of Varzy, Monsieur,” said the doctor, 
making a second genuflection. 

“Fata,” said my uncle, “you are a poltroon; I sus- 


114 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


pected as mucli ; But you sliall account to me for this 
conduct.” 

“ So,” said the Marquis to Fata, “ you are acquainted 
with this man ? ” 

“Very slightly. Monsieur Marquis, I swear it: I 
know him only from having dined with him at M. 
Minxit’s ; hut from the moment that he fails in the 
respect that he owes to nobility, I know him no more.” 

“And I,” said my uncle, “am just beginning to know 
him.” 

“What, Monsieur Fata of Yarzy,” continued the 
Marquis, “ do you dine with that queer fellow Minxit? ” 

“Oh, by chance. Monseigneur, one day when I was 
passing through Corvol. I know very well that this 
Minxit is not a man to associate with; he is a hare- 
brained fellow, a man spoiled by his wealth, and who 
thinks himself as good as a gentleman. Hi ! hi ! who 
gave me that kick from behind ? ” 

“I did,” said Benjamin, “in behalf of Monsieur 
Minxit.” 

“Now,” said the Marquis, “you have nothing more 
to do here, Monsieur Fata; leave me alone with your 
travelling companion. So then,” he added, addressing 
my uncle, “ you persist in not saluting me ? ” 

“If you salute me first, I will salute you second,” 
said Benjamin. 

“ And that is your last word? ” 

“Yes:” 

“You have carefully considered what you are do- 
ing?” 

“ Listen,” said my uncle : “ I wish to show deference 
for your title, and to prove to you how accommodating 
I am in everything that concerns etiquette.” 


MY tJISrCLE BENJAmK. 115 

Then he took* a coin from his pocket, and, tossing it 
in the air, said to the Marqnis : 

“ Heads or tails ? Gentleman or doctor, he whom 
fortune shall designate shall be the first to salute, and 
from this there shall be no appeal.” 

“ Insolent fellow,” said the fat, chub-faced steward, 
“ do you not see that you are most scandalously lacking 
in respect to Monseigneur. If I were in his place, I 
would have beaten you long ago.” 

“My friend,” answered Benjamin, “attend to your 
figures. Your lord pays you to rob him, not to give 
him advice.” 

Just then a game-keeper passed behind my uncle, and 
with the back of his hand knocked off his three-cornered 
hat, which fell in the mud. Benjamin had extraor- 
dinary- muscular strength : as he turned round, there 
was still on the game-keeper’s lips the broad smile 
which his trick had excited. My uncle, with one blow 
of his iron fist, sent the man head over heels, half into 
the ditch, half into the hedge that lined the road. The 
man’s comrades wanted to extricate him from the am- 
phibious position in which he thus found himself, but 
M. de Cambyse would not allow it. “ The rogue must 
learn,” said he, “ that the right of insolence does not 
belong to common people.” 

Keally I do not understand why my uncle, generally 
so philosophical, did not yield with .good grace to ne- 
cessity. I know very well that it is vexing to a proud 
citizen of the people, who feels his worth, to be obliged 
to salute a Marquis. But when we are under the sway 
of force, our free will is gone ; it is no longer an act 
performed, it is a result produced. We are nothing but 


116 


IVIY TTKCLE BENJAMIIT. 


a machine that is not responsible for its acts ; the man 
who does ns violence is the only one who can be re- 
proached for whatever is shameful or guilty in our 
action. Consequently I have always looked upon the 
invincible resistance of martyrs to their persecutors as 
an obstinacy scarcely worthy of being canonized. You 
wish, Antiochus, to throw me into boiling oil, if I refuse 
to eat pork ? I must first call your attention to the fact 
that we do not fry a man as we do a gudgeon ; but, if 
you persist in your demands, I eat your stew, and I even 
eat it with pleasure if it is well-cooked ; for to you, to 
you alone, Antiochus, will the digestion be dangerous. 
You, Monsieur de Cambyse, you demand, with your gun 
levelled at my breast, that I salute you? Well, Mar- 
quis, I have the honor to salute you. I know very well 
that after this formality you will be worth no more and 
I no less. There is only one case in which we ought, 
whatever may happen, to stand up against force, and 
that is when they try to make us oommit an act prejudi- 
cial to the nation, for we have no right to set our per- 
sonal interest before the public interest. 

But then, such was not the opinion of my uncle. As 
he stood firm in his refusal, M. de Cambyse had him 
seized by his valets and ordered them to return to the 
castle. Benjamin, pulled in front and pushed behind, 
and entangled with his sword, protested nevertheless 
with all his might against the violence to which they 
subjected him, and still found a way to distribute a few 
blows right and left. There were some peasants at 
work in the neighboring fields : my uncle appealed to 
them for help ; but they were careful not to allow the 
justice of his appeals, and even laughed at his martyr- 
dom in order to toady to the Marquis. 


MY UNCLE BENjAIVnN. 


117 


When they had reached the castle yard, M. de Cam- 
byse ordered that the gate he closed. He had the hell 
rung to summon all his people ; they brought two arm- 
chairs, one for him and one for his steward, and he 
began with this man a semblance of deliberation as to 
the fate of my poor uncle. He, in presence of this 
parody of justice, maintained a steadily firm attitude, 
and even kept his scornful and jeering air. 

The worthy steward favored twenty-five lashes and 
forty-eight hours in the old dungeon ; but the Marquis 
was in good humor, and even seemed to be slightly 
under the influence of wine. 

“ Have you anything to say in your defence ? ” said 
he to Benjamin. 

“ Come with me,” answered the latter. “ with your 
sword, to a distance of thirty paces from your castle, 
and I will acquaint you with my methods of defence.” 

Then the Marquis rose and said : 

“ Justice, after having deliberated, condemns the in- 
dividual here present to kiss Monsieur the Marquis de 
Cambyse, lord of all this neighborhood, ex-lieutenant 
of musketeers, master of the wolf-hounds of the baili- 
wick of Clamecy, etc., etc., etc., in a spot which my 
aforesaid Lord de Cambyse is about to make known 
to him.” 

And at the same time he lowered his breeches.' The 
flunkeys understood his intention, and began to ap- 
plaud with all their might and to cry : “ Long live the 
Marquis de Cambyse ! ” 

As for my poor uncle, he roared with fury ; he said 
later that he feared a stroke of apoplexy at the time. 
Two game-keepers stood .with guns levelled, and they 


118 


]VIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


had received an order from the Marquis to fire at his 
first signal. 

“ One, two,” said the latter. 

Benjamin knew that the Marquis was a man to exe- 
cute his threat, he did not wish to run the risk of a gun- 
shot, and ... a few seconds later the justice of the 
Marquis was satisfied. 

“ All right,” said M. de Cambyse, “ I am content 
with you ; now you can boast of having kissed a Mar- 
quis.” 

He had him escorted by two armed game-keepers to 
the carriage entrance. Benjamin fled like a dog to 
Avhose tail a mischievous urchin has fastened a tin can ; 
as he was on the road to Corvol, he did not give him- 
self time to change his direction, and went straight to 
M. Minxit’s. 


CHAPTER IX 

M. MINXIT PKEPARES FOR WAR. 

Now, M. Minxit liad been informed, I know not by 
whom, — by rumor doubtless, which meddles with every- 
thing, — that Benjamin was held a prisoner at Saint- 
Pierre du Mont ; he knew no better way of delivering 
his friend than to take the castle of the Marquis by 
assault and then level it to the ground. Let those who 
laugh find me in history a war more just. Where the 
government does not know how to make the laws re- 
spected, the citizens must do justice themselves. 

M. Minxit’s yard resembled a camp-ground ; the mu- 
sicians, on horseback and armed with guns of all sorts, 
were already arranged in line of battle ; the old ser- 
geant, who had lately entered the doctor’s service, had 
taken command of this picked body. From the middle 
of the ranks rose a large flag made out of a window- 
curtain, on which M. Minxit had inscribed in printed 
letters, that no one might fail to see them : the lib- 
erty OF Benjamin or the ears of M. de Cambyse. 
This was his ultimatum. 

In the second line came the infantry, represented by 
five or six farm-hands carrying their picks on their 
shoulders, and four slaters of the neighborhood each 
equipped with his ladder. 

The barouche represented the baggage ; it was loaded 
with fagots with which to fill up the moats of the castle, 
which time itself had filled in several places. But 


120 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIN. 


M. Minxit was bound to do things regularly; he had 
taken the further precaution of putting his case of 
instruments and a big flask of rum in one of the pockets 
of the carriage. 

The warlike doctor, with feathers in his hat and a 
naked sword in his hand, wheeled about his troops and 
hastened the preparations for departure with a voice of 
thunder. 

It is customary for an army, before entering on a 
campaign, to be harangued. M. Minxit was not a man 
to fail in this formality. Now, this is what he said to 
the soldiers ; 

“ Soldiers, I will not say to you that Europe has its 
eyes fixed upon you, that your names will be handed 
down to posterity, that they will be engraved in the 
temple of glory, etc., etc., etc., because these phrases 
are the empty and barren seeds thrown to nincompoops ; 
but this is what I have to say : 

“ In all wars soldiers fight for the benefit of the sov- 
ereign ; generally they have not even the advantage of 
knowing why they die ; but you are going to fight in 
your own interest and in the interest of your wives and 
children, — those of you who have any. M. Benjamin, 
whom you all have the honor to know, is to become my 
son-in-law. In this capacity he will reign with me over 
you, and when I shall be no more, he will be your 
master ; he will be under infinite obligation to you on 
account of the dangers which you are to incur on his 
account, and he will reward you generously. 

“But it is not only to restore liberty to my son-in- 
law that you have taken up arms : our expedition also 
will result in the deliverance of the country from a 


]MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


121 


t5rrant who oppresses it, who crushes your wheat, who 
beats you when he meets you, and who behaves very 
badly with your wives. One good reason is enough to 
make a Frenchman fight courageously; you have two: 
then you are invincible. The dead shall have a decent 
burial at my expense, and the wounded shall be cared 
for in my house. Long live M. Benjamin Rathery ! 
Death to Cambyse ! Destruction to his castle ! ” 

“ Bravo, Monsieur Minxit I ” said my uncle, who had 
come in through a back gate, as became a conquered 
man. “ That was a well-prepared harangue ; if you 
had delivered it in Latin, I should have thought that 
you pillaged it from Titus Livius.” 

At sight of my uncle a general hurrah went up from 
the army. M. Minxit gave the order “ Place rest ! ” 
and took Benjamin into his dining-room. The latter 
gave an account of his adventures in the most circum- 
stantial manner, and mth a fidelity that statesmen do 
not always show in writing their memoirs. 

M. Minxit was horribly exasperated at the insult 
offered to his son-in-law, and ground all the stumps in 
his jaw. At first he could express himself only in 
curses ; but, when his indignation had quieted a little, 
he said : “ Benjamin, you are nimbler than I : you shall 
take command of the army, and we will march against 
Cambyse’s castle; where its turrets were, nettles and 
quitch-grass shall grow.” 

“ If you say so,” said my uncle, “ we will level even 
the mountain of Saint-Pierre du Mont ; but, saving the 
respect that I owe to your opinion, I believe that we 
ought to act strategically: we will scale the walls of 
the castle by night ; we will seize de Cambyse and al] 


122 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


his lackeys plunged in wine and sleep, as Virgil says ; 
and they will all have to kiss us.” 

“That’s a fine idea,” answered M. Minxit. “We 
have a good league and a half to travel before we reach 
the place, and it will he dark in an hour : run and kiss 
my daughter, and we will start.” 

“ One moment,” said my uncle. “ The devil ! how 
you go on ! I have eaten nothing to-day, and I should 
rather like to breakfast before we start.” 

“ Then,” said M. Minxit, “ I will give the order to 
break ranks, and a ration of wine shall be distributed 
to our soldiers to keep them in breath.” 

“ That’s right,” answered my uncle, “ they will have 
time to finish themselves, while I am taking my re- 
freshment.” 

Fortunately for the castle of the Marquis, lawyer 
Page, who was returning from a legal exaniination, 
came to ask permission to dine at M. Minxit’s. 

“You arrive opportunely. Monsieur Page,” said the 
warlike doctor ; “ I am going to enroll you in our ex- 
pedition.” 

“ What expedition ? ” said Page, who had not studied 
the right to make war. 

Then my uncle related his adventure and the way in 
which he proposed to avenge himself. 

“ Take care,” said lawyer Page ; “ the thing is more 
serious than you think. In the first place, as to suc- 
cess, how do you hope with seven or eight cripples to 
overcome a garrison of thirty domestics commanded by 
a lieutenant of musketeers ? ” 

“ Twenty men and all valid. Monsieur attorney,” said 
M. Minxit. 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


123 


“Very well,” said lawyer Page, coldly; “but the 
castle of M. de Cambyse is surrounded by walls ; will 
those walls tumble, like those of Jericho, at the sound 
of cymbals and bass-drum? Suppose, however, that 
you take the castle of the Marquis by assault : it un- 
doubtedly will be a fine feat of arms ; but this exploit 
is not calculated to win for you the cross of Saint Louis ; 
where you see only a good bit of fun and legitimate 
reprisals, justice will see a case of breaking and enter- 
ing, a scaling of walls, a violation of domicile, a night 
attack, and all these, furthermore, against a Marquis. 
The least of these things involves the penalty of the 
galleys, I warn you ; you will be obliged therefore after 
your victory to make up your mind to leave the country, 
and that to what end? Simply to force a Marquis to 
kiss you. 

“ When one can avenge himself without risk and 
without damage, I admit vengeance; but to avenge 
one’s self to one’s own detriment is a ridiculous thing, 
an act of folly. You say, Benjamin, that you have been 
insulted; but what is an insult? Almost always an 
act of brutality committed by the stronger to the preju- 
dice of the weaker. Noav, how can another’s brutality 
damage your honor ? Is it your fault if this man is a 
miserable savage, who knows no other right than might ? 
Are you responsible for his cowardice ? If a tile should 
fall on your head, would you run to break it into pieces ? 
Would you think yourself insulted by a dog who had 
bitten you, and would you challenge him to a single 
combat, like that of the poodle of Montargis with the 
assassin of his master ? If the insult dishonors anyone, 
it is the insulting party: all honest people are , on the 


124 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


side of the insulted. When a butcher maltreats a sheep, 
tell me, are we indignant at the shee^D ? 

“If the evil that you wish to do to your insulter 
would cure you of that which he has done to you, I 
could understand your thirst for revenge ; hut if you 
are the weaker, you will bring down upon yourself new 
cruelties ; if, on the contrary, you are the stronger, you 
have still to take the trouble to fight your adversary. 
Thus the man who avenges himself always plays the 
role of a dupe. The precept of Jesus Christ which tells 
us to forgive those who have offended us is not only a 
fine moral precept, hut also sensible advice. From all 
which I conclude that you will do well, my dear Ben- 
jamin, to forget the honor that the Marquis has done 
you, and to drink with us until night to drown this 
recollection.” 

“ For my part, I am not at all of cousin Page’s 
opinion. It is always pleasant and sometimes useful 
to loyally return the evil that has been done us : it is 
a lesson that we give to the wicked. It is good that 
they should know that it is at their own risk and peril 
that they abandon themselves to their mischievous in- 
stincts. To leave undisturbed the viper that has bitten 
you when you might crush it, and to forgive the wicked, 
is the same thing. Generosity in such a case is not only 
stupidity, it is a wrong done to society. Though Jesus 
Christ said : ‘ Forgive your enemies,’ Saint Peter cut off 
Malchus’s ear ; these things compensate each other.” 

My uncle was as obstinate as if he had been the son 
of a horse and an ass, and for that matter obstinacy is 
an hereditary vice in our family : nevertheless he agreed 
that lawyer Page was right. 

“I believe. Monsieur Minxit,” said he, “ that you will 


INIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


125 


do very well to put your sword back in the scabbard 
and your plumed hat in its box. One should make war 
only for extremely serious reasons, and the king who 
unnecessarily drags a part of his people to those vast 
slaughter-houses known as battle-fields is an assassin. 
Perhaps you would be flattered, Monsieur Minxit, to 
take rank among the heroes ; but what is the glory of 
a general ? Cities in ruins, villages in ashes, countries 
ravaged, women abandoned to the brutality of the sol- 
dier, chijdren led away captive, casks of wine staved in 
in the cellars. Have you not read F^nelon, Monsieur 
Minxit? All these things are atrocious, and I shudder 
at the very thought of them.” 

“What are you talking about?” answered Monsieur 
Minxit ; “ this is a question only of a few blows of a 
pick-axe at some old crumbling walls.” 

“Well,” said my uncle, “why take the trouble to 
knock them down when they are so willing to fall of 
themselves ? Believe me, restore peace to this beautiful 
country ; I should be a coward and a wretch if I should 
suffer you, in order to avenge an injury wholly personal 
to myself, to expose yourself to the manifold dangers 
that must result from our expedition.” 

“But I too,” said M. Minxit, “have some personal 
injuries to avenge on this country squire ; he once sent 
me, out of derision, a horse’s urine to consult for. human 
urine.” 

“ A fine reason for risking six years in the galleys ! 
No, Monsieur Minxit, posterity would not absolve you. 
If you will not think of yourself, think of your daugh- 
ter, of your dear Arabelle: what pleasure would she 
take in making such good cream cheeses, if you were 
no longer here to eat them?” 


9 


126 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


This appeal to the paternal feelings of the old doctor 
had its effect. 

“At least,” said he, “you promise me that justice 
shall be done to M. de Cambyse for his insolence ; for 
you are my son-in-law, and from this time forth, where 
honor is concerned, we are as one man instead of two.” 

“Oh! rest easy as to that. Monsieur Minxit, I shall 
always have an eye open for the Marquis. I shall 
watch him with the patient attention of a cat that 
watches a mouse ; some day or other I shall catch him 
alone and without an escort ; then he will have to cross 
his noble sword with my rapier, or else I will beat him 
to my satisfaction. I cannot swear, like the old knights, 
to let my beard grow or to eat hard bread until I have 
avenged myself, because one of these things would not 
be fitting in our profession and the other is contrary to 
my temperament ; but I swear not to become your son- 
in-law until the insult that has been offered me shall 
have been gloriously atoned for.” 

“No, no,” answered M. Minxit; “you go too far, 
Benjamin; I do not accept this impious oath; you 
must, on the contrary, marry my daughter ; you will 
avenge yourself as well afterward as before.” 

“Do you think so. Monsieur Minxit? From the 
moment that I must fight to the death with the Marquis, 
my life lio longer belongs to me ; I cannot allow my- 
self to marry your daughter, simply perhaps to leave 
her a widow on the day after her wedding.” 

The good doctor tried to shake my uncle’s resolution, 
but, seeing that he could not succeed, he decided to go 
change his costume and disband his army. Thus ended 
this great expedition, which cost humanity little blood, 
but M. Minxit much wine. 


CHAPTER X. 

HOW MY UNCLE MADE THE MAKQUIS KISS HIM. 

Benjamin had slept at Corvol. 

The next day, as he was leaving the house with 
M. Minxit, the first person whom they saw was Fata. 
The latter, who did not feel a clear conscience, would 
rather have met two big wolves in his path than my 
uncle and M. Minxit. Still, as he could not run away, 
he decided to put the best face he could on the matter, 
and approached my uncle. 

“How do you do. Monsieur Rathery ? How is your 
health, honorable Monsieur Minxit? Well, Monsieur 
Benjamin, how did you get out of your difficulty with 
our Gessler ? I was terribly afraid that he might serve 
you a bad trick, and I did not close my eyes all night.” 

“Fata,” said M. Minxit, “keep your obsequiousness 
for the Marquis when you shall meet him. Is it true 
that you told M. de Cambyse that you no longer know 
Benjamin ? ” 

“I do not remember that, my good Monsieur 
Minxit.” 

“Is it true that you told the same Marquis that I 
was not a man to associate with?” 

“I could not have said that, my dear Monsieur 
Minxit ; you know how much I esteem you, my friend.” 

“I affirm on my honor that he said both those 
things,” said my uncle, with the icy sang-froid of a 
judge. 


127 


128 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“Very well,” said M. Minxit; “then we will settle 
his accoTint.” 

“Fata,” said Benjamin, “I warn you that M. Minxit 
desires to flog you. Here, then, is my switch ; for the 
honor of the profession, defend yourself ; a doctor 
cannot allow himself to be beaten like an ass.” 

“ The law is on my side,” said Fata ; “ if he strikes 
me, every blow will cost him dear.” 

“I sacrifice a thousand francs,” said M. Minxit, 
making his whip whistle in the air ; “ take that, Fata^ 
fatorum^ destiny, providence of the ancients I and that, 
and that, and that, and that ! ” 

The peasants had come to their door-ways to see 
Fata flogged; for — I say it to the shame of our poor 
humanity — notliing is so dramatic as a man ill-treated. 

“ Gentlemen,” cried Fata, “ I place myself under your 
protection.” 

But no one left his place. For M. Minxit, through 
the consideration which he enjoyed, had almost the 
right of administering petty justice in the village. 

“ Then,” continued the unfortunate Fata, “ I call you 
to witness the violence practised on my person; I am a 
doctor of medicine.” 

“Wait,” said M. Minxit, “I will strike harder, in 
order that those who do not see the blows may hear 
them, and that you may have some scars to show to the 
bailiff.” 

And in fact he did strike harder, ferocious plebeian 
that he was. 

“Rest easy, Minxit,” said Fata, as he went away, 
“you wilt have to deal with M. de Cambyse: he will 
not suffer me to be maltreated because I salute him.” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


129 


“You will say to Cambyse,” said M. Minxit, “that I 
mock at him, that I have more men than he, that my 
house is more solid than his castle, and that, if he wishes 
to come to-morrow to the plateau of Fertiant with his 
people, I am his man.” 

Let us say directly, to end with this affair, that Fata 
had M. Minxit cited before the bailiff to answer for the 
violence committed on his person ; but that he could 
find no witness to testify to the fact, although the 
thing had happened in the presence of a hundred in- 
dividuals. 

When my uncle reached Clamecy, his sister handed 
him a letter postmarked Paris, of the following tenor : — 

“ Monsieur Rather y : 

“ I have it on good authority that you intend to 
marry Mile. Minxit; I expressly forbid you to do so. 

“ViCOMTE DE PoNT-CaSSE.” 

My uncle sent Gaspard to get a sheet of royal writ- 
ing paper ; he took Mache court’s ink-stand, and straight- 
way answered this missive. 

“ Monsieur Vicomte : 

“ You may go 

“ Accept the assurance of the respectful sentiments 
with which I have the honor to be 

“ Your humble and devoted servant, 

“B. Rathery.” 

Whither did my uncle wish to send his vicomte ? I 
do not know. I have made useless inquiries to pene- 
trate the mystery of this reticence ; but at any rate I 
have given you an idea of the firmness, clearness, nerve, 


130 


l^IY UNCLE BENJAlvnN. 


and precision of his style when he saw fit to take the 
trouble to write. 

Meanwhile, my uncle had not abandoned his ideas 
of revenge; quite the contrary. The following Friday, 
after having visited his patients, he sharpened his sword 
and put on Machecourt’s overcoat over his red coat. 
As he did not wish to sacrifice his cue, and as he could 
not put it in his pocket, he hid it under his old wig, 
and went thus disguised to watch his Marquis. He 
established his headquarters in a sort of wine-shop situ- 
ated on the edge of the Clarnecy road opposite the 
castle of M. de Cambyse. The proprietor of the estab- 
lishment had just broken his leg. My uncle, always 
prompt to come to the aid of his neighbor when he was 
fractured, made known his profession and offered the 
help of his art to the patient. He was authorized by 
the afflicted family to put back in their proper place 
the two frajgments of the broken shinbone ; which he 
did quickly and to the great admiration of the two 
grand lackeys in the livery of M. de Cambyse, who 
were drinking in the wine-shop. 

My uncle, when the operation was finished, took up 
his position in an upper chamber of the tavern, directly 
above the sign, and began to observe the castle with a 
spy-glass, which he had borrowed from M. Minxit. He 
had been waiting there a good hour and had not yet 
noticed anything by which he could profit, when he 
saAv a lackey of M. de Cambyse descending the hill at 
full speed. This man came to the door of the wine- 
shop, and asked if the doctor was still there. Being 
answered in the affirmative by the servant, he went up 
to my uncle’s room, and, doffing his hat very low, 


UNCLE BENJAJMIN. 


181 


begged him to give attendance on M. de Cambyse, who 
had just swallowed a fish-bone. My uncle at first was 
tempted to refuse. But he reflected that this circum- 
stance might favor his project of revenge, and he de- 
cided to follow the domestic. 

The latter ushered him into the chamber of the Mar- 
quis. M. de Cambyse was in his arm-chair, with his 
head resting on his hands, and his elbows on his knees, 
and he seemed to be the victim of a violent agitation. 
The Marquise, a pretty brunette of twenty-five years, 
stood beside him, trying to reassure him. On the ar- 
rival of my uncle, the Marquis raised his head and 
said : 

“At dinner I swallowed a fish-bone, which has stuck 
in my throat. I had heard that you were in the village, 
and I have sent for you, although I have not the honor 
of' knowing you, persuaded that you will not refuse me 
your aid.” 

“We owe that to everybody,” answered my uncle, 
with an icy Bang-froid ; “ to the rich as well as to the 
poor, to gentlemen as well as to peasants, to the wicked 
as well as to the just.” 

“This man frightens me,” said the Marquis to his 
wife, “make him go out.” 

“But,” said the Marquise, “you know very well that 
np doctor will venture to come to the castle ; since you 
have this one here, try at least to keep him.” 

The Marquis surrendered to this opinion. Benjamin 
examined the sick man’s throat, and shook his head 
with an air of anxiety. The Marquis turned pale. 

“ What is the matter ? ” said he ; “ can the trouble 
be more serious than we had supposed?” 


132 


MY UNCLE BENJAIVIIN. 


“I do not know what you have supposed,” an- 
swered Benjamin, in a solemn voice, “ but the trouble 
will indeed be very serious, if the necessary measures 
are not promptly taken to combat it. You have swal- 
lowed a bone from a salmon, and the bone is. from the 
tail, the very place where they are most poisonous.” 

“ That is true,” said the astonished Marquise; “but 
how did you find that out ? ” 

“ By inspection of the throat, Madame.” 

The fact is that he had found it out in a very natural 
way. In passing by the dining-room, the door of which 
was open, he had seen on the table a salmon, of which 
only the tail was missing, and he had inferred that to 
the tail of this fish had belonged the swallowed fish- 
bone. 

“We have never heard,” said the Marquise, in a voice 
trembling with fright, “that the bones of the salmon 
were poisonous.” 

“ That does not alter the fact that they are exceed- 
ingly so,” said Benjamin, “and I should be sorry to 
have Madame Marquise doubt it, for I should be obliged 
to contradict her. The bones of the salmon contain, 
like the leaves of the manchineel tree, a substance so 
bitter and corrosive that, if this bone should remain a 
half-hour longer in the throat of Monsieur Marquis, it 
would produce an inflammation which I could not sub- 
due, and the operation would become impossible.” 

“ In that case, doctor, operate directly, I beg of you,” 
said the Marquis, more and more frightened. 

“One moment,” said my uncle; “the thing cannot 
proceed as rapidly as you desire ; there is first a little 
formality to be fulfilled.” 


MY XJKCLE BENJAMIN. 


133 


“ Fulfil it, then, very quickly, and begin.” 

“But this formality concerns you; you alone must 
accomplish it.” 

“ Then tell me at least of what it consists, surgeon of 
misfortune I Do you wish to leave me to die for want 
of acting ? ” 

“ I still hesitate,” continued Benjamin, slowly. 
“ How shall I venture such a proposition as that which 
I have to make to you ? With a Marquis ! With a 
man who descends in a direct line from Cambyse, king 
of Egypt ! ” 

“ I believe, wretch, that you are taking advantage of 
my position to make sport of me,” cried the Marquis, 
the violence of his character coming to the surface. 

“ Not the least in the world,” answered Benjamin, 
coldly. “ Do you remember a man whom three months 
ago you had dragged to your castle by your myrmidons 
because he did not salute you, and upon whom you in- 
flicted the most outrageous affront that one man can 
inflict upon another?” 

“ A man whom I forced to kiss .... In fact, you are 
the man. I recognize you by your five feet ten inches.” 

“Well, the man of five feet ten inches, this man 
whom you regarded as an insect, as a grain of dust 
whom you would never meet except under your feet, 
'now demands of you reparation of the insult which you 
have offered him.” 

“ My God ! I ^ ask nothing better ; fix the sum at 
which you value your honor, and I will have it counted 
out to you directly.” 

“ Do you think, then. Marquis de Cambyse, that you 
are rich enough to pay for the honor of an honest man ? 


184 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


Do you take me for a lawyer? Do you think thatl 
would submit to an insult for money? No, no, it is a 
reparation of honor that I want. A reparation of 
honor! Do you understand. Marquis de Cambyse?” 

“Well, so be it,” said M. de Cambyse, whose eyes 
were fixed on the hands of his clock, and who saw with 
terror the fatal half-hour slipping by; “I will declare 
in presence of Madame Marquise, I will declare it in 
writing, if you say so, that you are a man of honor, and 
that I did wrong in offending you.” 

“The devil! you have a summary way of paying 
your debts. Do you think, then, that, when you 
have insulted an honest man, you have only to admit 
that jmu were wrong, and that all is mended? To- 
morrow you would laugh heartily in the company of 
your country squires at the simpleton who had con- 
tented himself with this semblance of satisfaction. No, 
no, it is the penalty of retaliation to which you must 
submit; the weak man of yesterday has become' the 
strong man of to-day ; the"worm has turned into a ser- 
pent. You shall not escape my justice, as you escape 
that of the bailiff; there is no protection that can 
defend you against me. I have kissed you; you must 
kiss me.” 

“Have you, then, forgotten, wretch, that I am the 
Marquis de Cambyse ? ” 

“You forgot that I was Benjamin Rathery. An im 
suit is like God ; all men are equal before it. There is 
neither great insulter nor little insulted.” 

“ Lackey,” said the Marquis, whose wrath made him 
forget the supposed danger that he incurred, “take this 
man into the yard, and have him given a hundred 
lashes; I want to hear him howl from here.” 


ILY UKCLE BEKJAMIIs^. 


135 


‘‘Very well,” said my uncle, “ but in ten minutes the 
operation will have become impossible, and in an hour 
you will be dead.” 

“But can I not send to Varzy by my footman for a 
surgeon ? ” 

If your footman finds the surgeon at home, he will 
arrive just in time to see you die, and bestow his care 
upon Madame Marquise.” 

“ But it is not possible,” said the Marquise, “ that 
you should remain inflexible. Is there not, then, more 
pleasure in forgiveness than in vengeance ? ” 

“ Oh, Madame,” replied Benjamin, bowing gracefully, 
“ I beg you to believe that, if- it was from you that I 
had received such an insult, I should harbor no grudge 
against you.” 

Madame de Cambyse smiled, and, understanding that 
there was nothing to be gained with my uncle, she her- 
self urged her husband to submit to necessity, and 
called his attention to the fact that he had but five min- 
utes left in which to make up his mind. 

The Marquis, overcome by terror, made a sign to the 
two lackeys who were in his room to retire. 

“ No,” said the inflexible Benjamin, “ that is not what 
I desire. Lackey, you will go, on the contrary, to notify 
the people of M. de Cambyse to gather here in his 
name. • They witnessed the insult ; they must witness 
the reparation. Madame Marquise alone can be per- 
mitted to retire.” 

The Marquis glanced at the clock, and saw that there 
were but three minutes left. As the lackey did not 
budge, he said : 

“ Hurry, Pierre, and execute Monsieur’s orders; do 


136 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


you not see that he alone is master here for the mo- 
ment?” 

The domestics arrived one after another ; none were 
lacking but the steward ; but Benjamin, unrelenting to 
the end, would not begin until he was present. 

“Well,” said Benjamin, “now we are quits, and all 
is forgotten ; therefore I will conscientiously attend to 
your throat.” 

He extracted the bone very quickly and well, and 
placed it in the hands of the Marquis. While the latter 
was examining it with curiosity, he said ; 

“ I must give you some air.” 

Then he opened a window, leaped into the yard, and 
with two or three strides of his long legs reached the 
carriage-entrance. While he was hurrying down the 
hillside, the Marquis stood at a window, shouting : 

“ Stop, Monsieur Benjamin Rathery ; pray stop ; 
come back and receive my thanks and those of Ma- 
dame Marquise. I must pay you for your operation.” 

But Benjamin was not a man to be caught by these 
fine words. At the foot of the hill he met the foot- 
man of the Marquis. 

“ Landry,” said he to him, “ my compliments to Ma- 
dame Marquise, and reassure M. de Cambyse in regard 
to salmon bones ; they are no more poisonous than 
those of a pike ; only they should not be swallowed. 
Let him keep his throat wrapped in a poultice, and in 
two or three days he will be cured.” 

As soon as my uncle was out of reach of the Mar- 
quis, he turned to the right, crossed the meadows of 
Flez and the thousand brooks which intersected them. 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


137 


and went to Corvol. He desired to regale M. Minxit 
with the first news of his expedition ; he saw him from 
a distance standing before his door, and waving his 
handkerchief as a sign of triumph, he shouted : 

“ We are revenged.” 

The good man ran to meet him, with all the speed 
of his short fat legs, and threw himself into his arms 
with the same effusion as if he had been his son ; my 
iiiicle said that he even saw two big tears roll down 
his cheeks, which he tried to hide. The old doctor, 
whose nature was no less proud and irascible than 
Benjamin’s, was exultant with joy. On reaching the 
house he told the musicians, in order to celebrate the 
glory of the day, to execute trumpet-flourishes until 
night, and then he ordered them to get drunk, — an 
order which was punctually executed. 


CHAPTER XI. 

HOW MY UNCLE HELPED HIS TAILOR TO SEIZE HIM. 

Nevertheless, Benjamin came back to Clamecy a 
little disturbed at his own audacity. But the next day 
the footman of the castle delivered to him in behalf of 
his master, together with a considerable sum of money, 
a note that read as follows : 

“ The IMarquis de Cambyse begs M. Benjamin Ra- 
thery to forget what has passed between them, and to 
receive, in payment for the operation which he has so 
skilfully executed, the insignificant sum which he sends 
him.” 

“ Oh,” said my uncle, after reading this letter, “ this 
good lord would like to purchase my discretion; he 
even has the honesty to pay me in advance ; it is a pity 
that he does not treat all his trades-people in the same 
way. If I had simply, vulgarly, and without any pre- 
liminary extracted the fish-bone that he had planted in 
his throat, he would have put six francs in my hand 
and sent me to eat a bite in the kitchen. The moral of 
this is that ivith the great it is better to he feared than to 
he loved. May God damn me if during my life I ever 
fail in this principle ! 

“ Nevertheless, as I have no intention of being dis- 
creet, I cannot conscientiously keep the money which 
he sends me as the wages of my discretion ; one should 
be honest with everybody, or else have nothing to do 
with them. But let us count the money in this bag ; 


]MY UNCLE BENJA^VUN. 


139 


let us see how much he pays for the operation, and how 
much he gives for silence : one hundred and fifty francs ! 
Thunder ! Cambyse is generous ; he will allow only 
twelve sous, without any guarantee of not being beaten, 
to the thrasher who swings his flail from three o’clock 
in the morning until eight o’clock at night, and he pays 
me one hundred and fifty francs for a quarter of an 
hour’s work : there’s magnificence for you ! 

“For the extraction of this bone M. Minxit would 
have asked a hundred francs ; but he practises medi- 
cine on the grand orchestra and the grand spectacle 
plan ; he has four horses and twelve musicians to feed. 
For me, who have to support only my case of instru- 
ments and my hypostasis, — an hypostasis, it is true, of 
five feet nine inches, — two pistoles is all that that is 
worth. So, taking twenty from one hundred and fifty, 
there are thirteen pistoles to send back to the Marquis ; 
I almost feel remorse at taking any of his money. .This 
operation for which I charge him twenty francs I would 
not have failed to perform for a thousand francs, — a 
thousand francs to be paid of course after my death. 
This poor grand lord, how wretched and pitiful he 
looked with his pale and suppliant face and his salmon- 
bone in his throat ! How nobility apologized in his 
person to the people represented in mine ! He would 
willingly have allowed me to fasten his escutcheon be- 
hind his back. If at that time there were in his salon 
any portraits of his ancestors, their brows must still be 
red with shame. I would like J;he little spot where he 
kissed me to b6 separated from my person after my 
death, and transferred to the Pantheon . . . when the 
people have a Pantheon, I mean of course. 


140 


MY UNCLE BENJAIVUN. 


“ But, Marquis, you are not to be let off in this way : 
before three days the bailiwick will know your advent- 
ure ; I even intend to have it related to posterity by 
Millot-Rataut, our maker of songs ; he must manufact- 
ure for me on this subject half a handful of Alexandrines. 
As for these twenty francs, they are money found ; I 
do not wish them to pass through my dear sister’s hands. 
To-morrow is Sunday; to-morrow, then, I give my 
friends with this money a luncheon such as I have 
never given them, a luncheon for which I will pay cash. 
It is well to let them know how a man of wit can 
avenge himself without recourse to his sword.” 

The thing thus arranged, my uncle began to write 
to the Marquis to announce the return of his money. 
I should be delighted if I could give my readers a new 
specimen of my uncle’s epistolary style. Unhappil}^, 
his letter is not to be found among the historical docu- 
ments which my grandfather has handed down to us ; 
perhaps my uncle the tobacco-merchant made a cornet 
of it. 

While Benjamin was in the act of writing, his tailor 
came in with a bill in his hand. 

“What’s that?” said Benjamin, laying his pen on 
the table; “your bill again. Monsieur Bonteint, forever 
your eternal bill ? My God ! you have presented it to 
me so many times that I know it'by heart : six ells of 
scarlet full width, with ten ells of lining and three sets 
of carved buttons, isn’t that right ? ” 

“That’s right, MonsiqBr Rathery, exactly right; a 
total of one hundred and fifty francs ten sous six 
deniers. May I be excluded from Paradise as a rascal 
if I do not lose at least a hundred francs on this trans- 
action ! ” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


141 


“ If that is the case,” rejoined my uncle, “ why con- 
tinue to waste your time in scribbling off all these ugly 
bits of paper? You know very well. Monsieur Bon- 
teint, that I never have any monejL” 

“ I see, on the contrary. Monsieur Rathery, that you 
have some, and that I arrive at an opportune moment. 
Here on this table is a bag which must contain almost 
the exact amount of my bill, and if you will permit 
it ” . . . 

“One moment,” said my uncle, quickly laying his 
hand on the bag ; “ this money does not belong to me. 
Monsieur Bonteint. Here is the very letter of return 
which I have just written, and on which you have 
caused me to make a blot. Here,” he added, offering 
the letter to the merchant, “if you wish to read it ” . . . 

“ It is useless. Monsieur Rathery, utterly useless. 
All that I want to know is at what time you will have 
some money that belongs to you.” 

“Alas! M. Bonteint, who can foresee the future? 
What you ask I would very much like to know my- 
self.” 

“That being so. Monsieur Rathery, you will not 
blame me if I go directly to Parlanta to tell him to 
push the suit that I have begun against you.” 

“ You are in ill-humor, respectable Monsieur Bon- 
teint. What sort of cloth clippings have you been 
walking on to-day?” 

“You must admit. Monsieur Rathery, that I at least 
have good reason to be ill-humored ; for three years you 
have owed me this money, and you put me off from 
month to month, on the strength of I know not what 
epidemic, of the arrival of which I see no sign. You 
10 


142 


IVIY UKCLE BENJAIVITN. 


are the cause of my daily quarrels with Madame Bom 
teint, who reproaches me with not knowing how to col- 
lect my bills, and who sometimes pushes her vivacity to 
the point of calling me a blockhead.” 

“Madame Bonteint is surely a very amiable lady; 
you are fortunate, Monsieur Bonteint, in having such a 
wife, and I beg you to present her my compliments as 
soon as possible.” 

“ I thank you, Monsieur Rathery, but my wife is, as 
they say, something of a Greek ; she prefers money to 
compliments, and she says that, if you had had to deal 
with my rival Grophez, you would long ago have been 
in the Boutron Hotel.” 

“The devil take it I” cried my uncle, furious that 
Bonteint showed no signs of retreating, “it is your 
fault if I have not settled with you ; all your rivals 
have been or are sick : Dutorrent has had inflammation 
of the chest twice this year ; Artichaut, the typhoid 
fever ; Sergifer has the rheumatism ; Ratine has had 
the diarrhoea for six months. But you enjoy perfect 
health; I have had no opportunity of supplying you 
any medicine ; you have a complexion like one of your 
pieces of nankeen, and Madame Boilteint resembles a 
statuette made out of fresh butter. Yo,u see I have 
been deceived ; I thought that you would be an honor 
to my clientage ; if I had known then what I know 
now, I would not have given you my custom.” 

“But, Monsieur Rathery, it seems to me that neither 
Madame Bonteint or myself are obliged to be sick in 
order to furnish you the means of paying your bills.” 

“And I declare to you. Monsieur Bonteint, that you 
are under precisely that moral obligation. How would 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIN. 


143 


you manage to pay your bills if your customers did 
not wear coats ? This obstinacy in keeping your health 
is an abominable procedure on your part ; it is a trap 
that you have set for me ; you ought at the present 
hour to have on my account-book an indebtedness of 
one hundred and fifty francs ; hence I deduct from 
your bill one hundred and thirty francs ten sous six 
deniers for the diseases that you ought to have had. 
You will admit that I am reasonable. You are very 
fortunate in having to pay for the medicine without 
having had to have the doctor, and I know many people 
who would like to be in your place. So, then, if from 
one hundi’ed and fifty francs ten sous six deniers we 
take one hundred and thirty francs ten sous six de- 
niers, there is a balance of twenty francs still due you ; 
if you wish them, there they are ; I advise you as a 
friend to take them ; you will not soon have so good an 
opportunity again.” 

“ I will willingly take them,” said M. Boitteint, “ as 
an instalment.” 

“ As a final settlement of the account,” insisted my 
uncle, “ and even then I need all my strength of soul 
to make this sacrifice. I intended this money for a 
bachelors’ breakfast, it was even my design to invite 
you, although you are the father of a family.” 

“This is more of your nonsense. Monsieur Rathery; 
I have never been able to get anything else from you. 
You know very well, however, that I have a seizure 
drawn up against you in good form, and that I might 
proceed to execution directly.” 

“ Well, it is precisely that of which I complain. Mon- 
sieur Bontemt; you have no confidence in your friends j 


144 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


why go to these useless expenses? Could you not 
come to me and say : ‘ Monsieur Rathery, it is my in- 
tention to have you seized.’ I Avould have answered: 
‘Seize me yourself, Monsieur Bonteint; you need no 
sheriff’s officer for that ; ’ I will even serve you as a 
bailiff’s man, if that will be agreeable to you; and 
besides, there is time enough yet; seize me on the in- 
stant ; do not stand on ceremony ; all that I have is at 
your disposition ; I permit you to pack up, wrap up, 
and carry away anything that you like.” 

“ What ! Monsieur Rathery, you would be good 
<enough ”... 

“Why, of course. Monsieur Bonteint, I should be 
delighted to be seized by your hands ; I will even help 
you to seize me.” 

My uncle then opened an old ruin of a wardrobe, in 
which were still hanging on a nail some bits of yellow 
copper lining, and, taking two or three old cue-ribbons 
from a drawer, he said to M. Bonteint, as he offered 
them to him : 

“See, you will not lose all; these articles will not 
count in the dotal ; I throw them in.” 

“ Indeed ! ” answered M. Bonteint. 

“This red morocco portfolio which you see is my 
case of instruments.” 

As M. Bonteint was about to lay his hand on it, 
Benjamin said : 

“ Softly ; the law does jiot allow you to touch that. 
My instruments are the tools of my profession, and I 
have a right to keep them.” 

But,” said M. Bonteint . . . 

Here now is a corkscrew, with an ebony handle in- 


MY UNCLE BENJAMN. 


145 


laid with silver. As for this article,” he added, as he 
put it in his pocket, “ I withdraw it from my creditors ; 
and besides^ I need it more than you do.” 

“But,” replied M. Bonteint, “if you keep everything 
that you need more than I do, I shall need no cart in 
which to carry away my plunder.” 

“One moment,” said my uncle, “yo.u will lose noth- 
ing by waiting. Here on this shelf are some old medi- 
cine bottles, some of which are cracked : I do not guar- 
antee their integrity ; I abandon them to you with all 
the spiders that are in them. On this other shelf is a 
large stuffed vulture; that wilt cost jmu nothing but 
the trouble of moving it, and it will make a very good 
sign for you.” 

“ Monsieur Rathery ! ” said Bonteint. 

“Here is Machecourt’s wedding wig; I don’t know 
how it happens to be here. I do not offer it to you, be- 
cause I know that you wear only a false forelock.” 

“What do you know about it. Monsieur Rathery?”- 
cried Bonteint, getting more and more irritated. 

“ Here in this bottle,” continued my uncle, with im- 
perturbable sang-froid^ “is a tapeworm which I have 
preserved in spirit of wine. You can use it to make 
garters for yourself, Madame Bonteint, and your chil- 
dren. I call your attention to the fact, however, that 
it would be a pity to mutilate this beautiful animal: 
you can boast of having in your possession the longest 
being in creation, n6t excepting the immense boa-con- 
strictor. For the rest, you will estimate it at what 
value you like.” 

“ Surely you are making sport of me. Monsieur Rath- 
ery ; all these things have not the slightest value.” 


146 


]\rY UNCLE BENJAjynN. 


“ I know that very well,” said my uncle, coldly, “ but 
then you have no bailiff’s man to pay. Now here, for 
instance, is an article worth in itself alone the entire 
amount of your bill : it is the stone that I extracted 
two or three years ago from the mayor’s bladder ; you 
can have it carved into the shape of a snuff-box ; put a 
band of gold about it and add a few precious stones, 
and it will make a very pretty birthday present for 
Madame Bonteint.” 

Bonteint, furious, started for the door. 

“One moment,” said my uncle, catching hold of the 
skirt of his coat. “ Don’t be in such a hurry. Monsieur 
Bonteint. I have shown you yet only the least of my 
treasures. Stay, here is an old engraving representing 
Hippocrates, the father of medicine ; I guarantee it a 
good likeness; furthermore, here are three incomplete 
volumes of the ‘ Medical Gazette,’ which will entertain 
you delightfully during these long winter evenings.” 

“ Once more. Monsieur Rathery ” . . . ‘ 

“Oh ! do not be angry, papa Bonteint; we have just 
reached the most valuable article among my posses- 
sions.” 

My uncle then opened an old closet, and took out 
two red coats, which he threw at M. Bonteint’s feet, 
and from which there arose a cloud of dust that made 
the good merchant cough, together with a swarm of 
spiders that scattered about the room. 

“ There,” said he, “ there are the last two coats that 
you sold me! You have outrageously deceived me, 
Monsieur Fauxteint : ^ they faded in one morning, like 
two rose leaves, and my dear sister could not even use 


*Bordeiintt good tint; Fauxteint, false tint.— Translator^ 


Uy uncle benjamin. 


147 


them to color tho Easter eggs for her children. You 
really deserve to have the cost of the coloring material 
deducted from your, bill.” 

“ Oh, really,” cried Bonteint, horrified, “ that is really 
too much; never was a creditor more insolently treated. 
To-morrow morning you shall hear from me. Monsieur 
Rathery.” 

“So much the better, Monsieur Bonteint; I shall 
always be delighted to learn that you are in good 
health. — By the way. Monsieur Bonteint, you are for- 
getting your cue-ribbons ! ” 

As Bonteint went out, lawyer Page came in. He 
found my uncle shouting with laughter. 

“What have you been doing to Bonteint?” he said; 
“I just met him on the stairs, almost red with anger; 
he was in such a violent crisis of exasperation that he 
did not bow to me as he passed.” 

“ The old imbecile,” said Benjamin, “ is angry with 
me because I have no money. As if that ought not to 
disturb me more than him ! ” 

“ You have no money, my poor Benjamin ! So much 
the worse, doubly so much the worse, for I came to 
offer you a golden bargain.” 

“ Offer it just the same,” said Benjamin. 

“ The vicar Djhiarcos wishes to get rid of a quarter- 
cask of Burgundy, which one of his devotees has given 
him, because he has the catarrh and Doctor Arnout will 
allow him only mild drinks ; as the diet is likely to be 
long, he is afraid that his wine may spoil. He wants 
this money to furnish some rooms for a poor orphan 
who has just lost her last aunt. So it is not only a 
good bargain, but a good deed that I propose to you.” 


148 


MY UXCLE BENJAMI^r. 


“Yes,” said Benjamin, “but without money it is not 
so easy to do a good deed ; good deeds are expensive, 
and cannot be done at will. But what is your opinion 
of the wine ? ” 

“Exquisite,” said Page, smacking his lips; “he made 
me taste it ; it is Beaune of the first quality.” 

“ And how much does the virtuous Djhiarcos want 
for it?” 

“ Twenty-five francs,” said Page. 

“ I have only twenty francs ; if he wants to part with 
it for twenty francs, it is a bargain. In that case we 
will lunch on credit.” 

“ His terms are twenty-five francs, take it or leave it. 
Twenty-five francs to relieve a poor orphan from pov- 
erty and preserve her from vice, — you will agree that 
that is not too much.” 

“ But if you had five francs. Page,” replied my uncle, 
“we could buy it together.” 

“ Alas ! ” said Page, “ it is a good fortnight since I 
have seen so much money. I believe that specie is 
afraid of M. de Calonne ; it retires ”... 

“ It does not always frequent the doctors,” said my 
uncle. “ So we must think no more of your quarter- 
cask.” 

For sole response. Page heaved a deep sigh. ' 

Just then came in my grandmother, carrying a big 
roll of linen in her arms, like an Infant Jesus. She 
placed the cloth enthusiastically on my uncle’s knees. 

“ See, Benjamin,” said she, “ I have just made a su- 
perb bargain ; I caught sight of this piece of cloth this 
morning, as I was making the tour of the fair-grounds. 
You need shirts, and I thought that it would just suit 


MY Ul^CLE BENJAMIN. 


149 


you. Madame Avril offered seventy-five francs for it ; 
she allowed the merchant to leave her, but I could see 
from the way in which she eyed him that she had a 
good mind to call him back. ‘ Let me see your cloth,’ 
said I then to the peasant. I offered him eighty francs ; 
I did not think that he would part with it for that 
sum. The linen is worth one hundred and twenty 
francs if it is worth a sou, and Madame Avril is furi- 
ous with me for having interfered with her bargain.” 

“And this linen,” cried my uncle, “yOu have bought, 
bought?” 

“ Bought,” said my grandmother, who did not under- 
stand Benjamin’s exasperation ; “ and there is no way 
of getting out of it ; the peasant is downstairs waiting 
for the money.” 

“Well, go to the devil!” cried Benjamin, throwing 
the roll across the room, “you and . . . That is, for- 
give me, my dear sister, forgive me, no ; do not go to 
the devil ; it is too far; but go carry the cloth back to 
the merchant : I have no money to pay for it.” 

“ And the money that you received this morning 
from M. de Cambyse?” asked my grandmother. 

“ Why, that money is not mine ; M. de Cambyse has 
given me too much.” 

“Too much? What do you mean?” answered my 
grandmother, looking at Benjamin in amazement. 

“ Why, yes, too mUch, my sister, too much, do you 
understand? too much. He sends me one hundred 
and fifty francs for a twenty -franc operation : now do 
you understand?” 

“And you are stupid enough to send him back his 
money? Well, I should like to see my husband play 
me such a trick as that.” 


150 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ Yes, I have been stupid enough for that*; what do 
you expect? Everybody cannot have the wit that you 
exact of Machecourt; I have been stupid enough for 
that, and I do not repent of it. I will not be a charla- 
tan to please you. My God I my God ! how difficult it 
is in this world to be an honest man ! Your nearest and 
your dearest are sure to be the first to lead you into 
temptation.” 

“ But you miserable fellow^, you lack everything ; you 
haven’t a pair of silk stockings that are presentable, 
and while I mend your shirts on one side, they fall to 
pieces on the other.” 

“And because my shirts fall to pieces on one side 
while you mend them on the other, must I fail in prob- 
ity, my dear sister ? ” 

“But your creditors, when will you pay them?” 

“ When I have the money, that is all ; I defy the 
richest man to do better.” 

“And the cloth merchant, what shall I tell him?” 

“Tell him what you like. Tell him that I don’t 
wear shirts, or that I have three hundred dozen in my 
closet ; he will choose which of these reasons suits him 
best.” 

“ Oh, my poor Benjamin ! ” said my grandmother, 
carrying off the linen, “ with all your wit you will never 
be anything but a fool.” 

“ In fact,” said Page, when my grandmother was at 
the foot of the stairs, “your dear sister is right; you 
push probity to the point of stupidity.” 

My uncle rose with vivacity, and, grasping the law- 
yer’s arm so firmly in his iron hand as to make him cry 
out with pain, he said : 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


151 


“Page, this is not simply probity, it is noble and 
legitimate pride; it is respect not only for myself, but 
also for our poor oppressed class. Would you have me 
allow this country squire to say that he offered me a 
sort of pourhoire and that I accepted it ? Do you wish 
them to hurl back at us, when their escutcheon is only 
a beggar’s badge, that charge of beggary which we have 
so often made against them? Would you have us give 
them the right to proclaim that we too receive alms 
when they are willing to bestow them upon us? 
Listen, Page, you know whether I love Burgundy; 
you know, too, from what my dear sister has just said, 
whether I need shirts ; but for all the vineyards of 
C5te-d’Or and all the hemp-fields of Pays-Bas, I would 
not have a single face in the bailiwick in presence of 
which I must hang my head. No, I will not keep this 
money, though I needed it to purchase my life. It is 
for us, men of heart and education, to do honor to these 
people in the midst of whom we were born ; they must 
learn through us that they do not need to be nobles in 
order to be men; that they may rise through self- 
esteem from the degradation into which they have 
fallen ; and that they may say at last to the handful of 
tyrants who oppress them: ‘We are as good as you 
are, and more numerous. Why should we continue to 
be your slaves, and why should you wish to remain our 
masters?’ Oh, Pa^e, may I live to see that day, if I 
have to drink sour wine all the rest of my life ! ” 

“ That is very fine,” said Page, “ but all that does not 
give us Burgundy.” 

“ Rest easy, drunkard, you will lose nothing. Sunday 
I am going to give you all a luncheon, with these 


152 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


twenty francs that I have taken from the throat of 
M. de Cambyse, and at dessert I will tell you their 
story. I am going to write directly to M. Minxit. 
I cannot have Arthus, inasmuch as I have only twenty 
francs to spend, or else he would have to dine copiously 
that day. But if you meet Rapin, Parlanta, and the 
others before I do, warn them not to make any other 
engagements.” 

I must say at once that this luncheon was postponed 
for a week because M. Minxit could not be there, and 
then indefinitely abandoned because my uncle was 
obliged to part with his two pistoles. 


CHAPTER XIL 

HOW MY UNCLE HUNG M. SUSURRANS TO A HOOK IN HTS 
KITCHEN. 

See how maTvellously fertile are the flowers : they 
scatter their seeds about them like rain ; they abandon 
them to the winds like dust ; they send them without 
stint, like those alms that mount to dark garrets, to the 
peaks of desolate rocks, among the old stones of cracked 
walls, amid ruins that fall and hang, and they will And 
a handful of earth to fertilize them, a drop of rain for 
their roots to suck, and, after a ray of light to make 
them grow, another ray to paint them. The departing 
breezes of the spring carry away the last perfumes of 
the meadows, and the earth is strewn with fading 
leaves ; but when the autumn breezes shall, pass, shak- 
ing their moist wings over the fields, another generation 
of flowers will have invested the earth with a new robe, 
and their feeble perfume will be the last breath of the 
dying year, which in dying smiles on us still. 

In all other respects, women are like flowers ; but in 
the matter of fecundity they bear no resemblance to 
them. Most women, ladies especially, — and I pray 
you, prolStaires my friends and brothers, to believe 
that I use this expression only to conform to custom, 
for to me the truest lady is the woman who is most 
amiable and the prettiest, — ladies, I say, produce no 
longer ; they become mothers of families as seldom as 
possible; they are barrem for economy’s sake. Wheii 

153 


154 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


the clerk’s wife has had her little clerk and the notary’s 
wife her little notary, they believe that they have ful- 
filled their obligation to the human race, and they ab- 
dicate. Napoleon, who was very fond of recruits for 
his armies, said that the woman whom he liked best 
was the woman who had the most children. Napoleon 
could very easily say this, having kingdoms instead of 
domains to give to his sons. The fact is that children 
are very expensive, and that this expense is not within 
the reach of everybody: the poor man alone can permit 
himself the luxury of a numerous family. Are you 
aware that the months required for the nursing of a 
child alone cost almost as much as a cashmere dress? 
Besides, the baby grows fast; then come the swollen 
accounts of the boarding-school proprietor and the bills 
of the shoemaker and the tailor ; the infant of to-day 
to-morrow will be a man, his moustache begins to grow, 
and there he is a bachelor of letters. Then you know 
not what to do with him. To get rid of him you buy 
him a fine profession ;• but you are not slow in perceiv- 
ing, from the drafts made on you from the four corners 
of the city, that this profession brings your professor 
nothing but invitations and visiting cards : you must 
keep him, till past the age of thirty, in kid gloves, 
Havana cigars, and mistresses. You will admit that 
that is very disagreeable. If there were a hospital for 
young people twenty years old, as there is or used to 
be for infants, I assure you that it would be crowded. 

But in the century when my uncle Benjamin lived, 
things went differently: that was the golden age of 
nurses and of mid wives. Women abandoned themselves 
to their instincts without concern and without fore- 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIN. 


155 


thought ; they all had children, rich and poor alike, 
and even those who had no right to have them. But 
in those days they knew what to do with these children; 
competition, that ogress with the steel fangs which de- 
vours so many little people, had not yet arrived. There 
was a place for everybody in the beautiful sunshine 
of France, and in eveiy profession there was plenty 
of elbow room. Places offered themselves, like fruit 
hanging from the branch, to men capable of filling 
them, and the fools themselves found situations, each 
according to the specialty of his foolishness; glory was 
as easily achieved, as accommodating a girl, as fortune ; 
it did not take half the wit that is required' now to be 
a man of letters, and with a dozen Alexandrines one was 
a poet. I do not say that I regret the loss of that blind 
fertility of the olden time, which produced like a 
machine without knowing what it did: I find that I 
have quite neighbors enough as it is ; I simply wish to 
make you understand how it was that at the period of 
wnich I speak my grandmother, although shn was not 
yet thirty years old, was already at her seventh child. 

So my grandmother was at her seventh child. My 
uncle absolutely insisted that his dear sister shotild be 
present at his wedding, and he had made M. Minxit 
consent to postpone the marriage until after my grand- 
mother’s churching. The wardrobe of the new comer 
was all white and embroidered, and his entrance upon 
existence was expected daily. The six other children 
were all living, and delighted at being in the world. 
Sometimes they lacked one a pair of shoes, another a 
cap ; now this one was out at the elbows, and now that 
one was out at the heels; but they had their white 


156 


IMY UNCLE BENJA]\rCN. 


starched shirts, and on the whole got along marvel- 
lously and flourished in their rags. 

My father, however, who was the eldest, was the best 
and most handsomely dressed of the six : that perhaps 
was due to the fact that his uncle Benjamin handed 
over to him his old knee-breeches, in which scarcely 
any change had to be made in order that Gaspard 
might wear them as pantaloons, and often no change 
at all. By the protection of cousin Guillaumot, who 
was sexton, he had been promoted to the dignity of 
choir boy, and, I say it with pride, he was one of the 
best choir boys in the diocese. If he had persisted in 
the career that cousin Guillaumot had opened for him, 
instead of the handsome captain of a fire company that 
he is to-day, he would have made a magnificent priest. 
It is true that I should still be sleeping in the void, as 
says the good M. de Lamartine, who sleeps himsell 
sometimes ; but sleep is an excellent thing, and besides, 
to live to be the editor of a country newspaper and the 
rival of the department of public wit, — is that really 
worth living for ? 

However that may be, my father owed to his Levit- 
ical functions the advantage of having a superb sky- 
blue coat. This is how that good fortune came to him ; 
the banner of Saint Martin, patron saint of Clamecy, 
had been dismissed ; my grandmother, with that eagle- 
eye of hers, had discovered in this holy stuff the where- 
withal to make her eldest son a jacket and a pair ot 
pantaloons, and she had succeeded in securing the cast- 
off banner from the vestrymen at a ridiculous price. 
The saint was painted in the very middle; the artist 
had represented him in the act of cutting off a piece of 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


157 


his cloak with his sabre to cover the nakedness of a 
beggar; but this was not a serious obstacle to my 
grandmother’s plan. She simply turned the material, 
so that Saint Martin came on the inside, which for that 
matter was quite immaterial to the saint. 

The coat had been finished by a seamstress in the 
Rue des Moulins : it would have fitted my uncle Benja- 
min perhaps quite as well as my father ; but my grand- 
mother had had it made in such a way that, after 
having been worn out the first time by the eldest son, 
it could be worn out a second time by the second son. 
At first my father strutted about in his sky-blue coat ; 
I even believe that he contributed out of his salary to 
pay for the making. But he was not slow in finding 
out that a magnificent garment is often like hair-cloth. 
Benjamin, to whom nothing was sacred, had nicknamed 
him the patron saint of Clamecy. This nickname the 
children had picked up, and it had cost my father many 
blows. More than once did it happen to him to come 
home with a piece of the sky-blue coat in his pocket. 
Saint Martin had become his personal enemy. Often 
you could have seen him at the foot of the altar 
plunged in gloomy meditation. Now, of what was he 
dreaming ? Of some way of getting rid of his coat ; and 
one day, to the Dominus vohiscum of the officiating 
clergyman, he responded, thinking that he was talking 
to his mother: “I tell you that I will never* wear your 
sky-blue coat again.” 

My father was in this state of mind when, on the 
Sunday after high mass, my uncle, having to pay a visit 
to Val-des-Rosiers, proposed to him to accompany him. 
Gaspard, who preferred playing quoits in the street to 
11 


158 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


serving as an aid to my uncle, answered that he could 
not, because he had a baptism to attend. 

“ That doesn’t hinder,” said Benjamin ; “ another will 
serve in your place.” 

“ Yes, but I must go to catechism at one o’clock.” 

“I thought that you had made your first com- 
munion.” 

“ It is true I came very near making it, but you pre- 
vented me by forcing me to get drunk the night before 
the ceremony.” 

“ And why did you get drunk ? ” 

“ Because you were drunk yourself, and threatened 
to beat me with the flat of your sword if I did not get 
drunk too.” 

“I was wrong,” said Benjamin, “but all the same 
you risk nothing by coming with me ; we shall not be 
long ; we shall return before the catechism hour.” 

“ Indeed ! ” answered Gaspard ; “ where another would 
take only an hour, you need half a day. You stop at 
all the taverns ; and the priest has forbidden me to go 
with you because you set me bad examples.” 

“Well, pious Gaspard, if you refuse to come with 
me, I will not invite you to my wedding ; if, on the 
contrary, you grant me this favor, I will give you 
twelve sous.” 

“ Give them to me now,” said Gaspard. 

“ And why do you wish them now, you scamp ? Do 
you distrust my word ? ” 

“ No, but I am not anxious to be your creditor. I 
have heard it said in the village that you pay nobody, 
and that they do not wish to seize your effects because 
your possessions are not worth thirty sous.” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


159 


“ Well said, Gaspard ! ” said my uncle ; “ here, there 
are fifteen sous, and go tell my dear sister that you are 
going with me.” 

My grandmother went clear to the threshold to ad- 
vise Gaspard to be very careful of his coat, for, she said, 
he must keep it for his uncle’s wedding. 

“ Are you joking ? ” said Benjamin ; “ is there any 
need of recommending a French choir boy to be care- 
ful of the banner of his patron saint ? ” 

‘‘ Uncle,” said Gaspard, ‘‘ before we start I warn you 
of one thing, — that, if you call me again banner-bearer, 
blue bird, or patron saint of Clamecy, I will run away 
with your fifteen sous, and come back to play quoits.” 

On entering the village my uncle met M. Susurrans, 
the grocer, very short and very thin, but made, like 
gun-powder, out of charcoal and saltpetre. M. Susur- 
rans had a sort of small farm at Val-des-Rosiers; he 
was on his way back to Clamecy, carrying under his 
arm a keg that he hoped to smuggle in, and at the 
end of his cane a pair of capons which Madame Susur- 
rans was waiting for to put on the spit. M. Susur- 
rans knew my uncle and esteemed him, for Benjamin 
bought of him the sugar with which he sweetened his 
drugs and the powder that he put on his cue. So M. 
Susurrans proposed to him to come to the farm to re- 
fresh himself. My uncle, to whom thirst was a normal 
condition, accepted without ceremony. The grocer and 
his customer established themselves at the corner of 
the fire, each on a stool; they placed the keg be- 
tween them; but they did not allow its contents to 
turn sour, and when it was not in the hands of one, it 
was at the lips of the other. 




160 


MY UNCLE BENJAISIIN. 


“ Appetite comes by drinking as well as by eating ; 
suppose we eat the chickens,” said M. Susurrans. 

“ In fact,” answered my uncle, “ that will save you 
the trouble of carrying them home, and I do not under- 
stand how you undertook to load yourself down with 
such a burden.” 

“ And with what sauce shall we eat them? ” 

“ With that which is quickest made,” said Benjamin, 
“ and here is an excellent fire with which to roast 
them.” 

‘^Yes,” said M. Susurrans, “but there are no kitchen 
utensils here save those that are necessary to make an 
onion soup: we have no spit.” 

Benjamin, like all great men, was never taken un- 
awares. 

“ It shall not be said,” he answered, “ that two men 
of wdt like ourselves were unable to eat a roasted fowl 
for want of a spit. If you say so, we will spit our 
chickens on the blade of my sword, and Gaspard here 
will turn them before the fire.” 

You would never have thought of this expedient, 
friendly reader, but my uncle had imagination enough 
for ten novelists of our day. 

Gaspard, who .did not often have a chance to eat 
chicken, went joyfully to work, and in an hour’s time 
the fowls were roasted to a turn. They turned a wash- 
tub upside-down, and dragged it up to the fire ; on 
this they placed the plates, knives, and forks, and thus, 
without leaving their seats, the guests were at table. 
Glasses were lacking ; but the keg was not long left 
still ; they drank out of the bunghole, as in the days of 
Homer ; it was not very convenient, but such was the 

t 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


161 


stoic character of my uncle that he would rather drink 
good wine thus than sour wine out of crystal glasses. 
In spite of the difficulties of all sorts which the opera- 
tion involved, the chickens Avere soon despatched. For 
some time the unfortunate birds had been nothing 
more than stripped carcasses, and still the tAvo friends 
kept on drinking. M. Susurrans, Avho Avas, as Ave have 
said, a very small man, Avhose stomach and brain al- 
most touched each other, was as drunk as well could be ; 
but Benjamin, the great Benjamin, had preserved the 
major part of his reason, and looked with pity on his 
Aveaker adversary ; as for Gaspard, to whom they had 
occasionally passed the keg, he Avent a little beyond the 
limits of temperance ; filial respect does not alloAA^’ me 
to use any other expression. 

Such Avas the moral situation of the guests when 
they left the wash-tub. It was then four o’clock, and 
they began to get ready to start. M. Susurrans, Avho 
remembered very Avell that he was to carry some 
chickens to his wife, looked about for them to place them 
on the end of his cane ; he asked my uncle if he had not 
seen them. 

“Your chickens,” said Benjamin; “are you joking? 
You have just eaten them.” 

“ Yes, you old fool,” added Gaspard, “you have eaten 
them ; they were spitted on my uncle’s SAVord, and I 
turned the spit.” 

“ It is not true,” cried M. Susurrans, “ for, if I had 
eaten my chickens, I should not be hungry, and I have 
appetite enough to devour a wolf.” 

“I do not deny it,” responded my uncle, “but it is 
non6 the less true that you have eaten your chickens. 


162 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


See, if. you doubt it, there are the two carcasses; you 
can hang them to the end of your cane if you like.” 

“You are lying, Benjamin; I do not recognize those 
as the carcasses of my chickens ; you have taken them 
from m.e, and you shall return them to me.” 

“Very well,” said my uncle, “send to my house for 
them to-morrow, and I will return them to you.” 

“You shall return them to me directly,” said M. 
Susurrans, rising on tip-toe to grasp my uncle by the 
throat. 

“Ah, there! papa Susurrans!” said Benjamin; “if 
you are joking, I warn you that this is carrying the 
joke too far, and ”... 

“No, you miserable fellow, I am not joking,” said M. 
Susurrans, placing himself in front of the door, “ and 
you shall not leave here, neither you nor your nephew, 
until you have restored my chickens.” 

“ Uncle,” said Gaspard, “ would you like me to trip 
up this old imbecile ? ” 

“it is useless, Gaspard, useless, my friend,” said 
Benjamin; “ besides, you are a churchman, and it does 
not become you to intervene in a quarrel. Say there ! ” 
he added, “ once, twice, M. Susurrans, will you let us 
go out ? ” 

“When you have restored my chickens,” answered' 
M. Susurrans, making a half turn to the left and pre- 
senting the end of his cane at my uncle as if it had 
been a bayonet. 

Benjamin lowered the cane with his hand, and, tak- 
ing the little man by the middle of the body, he hung 
him by the waistband to a piece of iron over the door 
which was used to hang kitchen utensils upon. 


ItY UNCLE BENJAINIIN. 


168 


Susurrans, thus likened to a saucepan, kicked about 
like a beetle pinned to a curtain. He screamed and 
gesticulated, crying no\v “Fire!” now “Murder!” 

My uncle caught sight of a Li^ge almanac which was 
lying on the mantel-shelf. Said he : 

“ Stay, Monsieur Susurrans ; study, writes Cicero, is 
a consolation in all situations of life : amuse yourself 
in studying until some one comes to take you down ; 
for I have no time to carry on a conversation with you, 
and I have the honor to wish you good evening.” 

My uncle had gone only twenty steps when he met 
the farmer running up, who asked him why his master 
was crying “ Fire ! ” and “ Murder ! ” 

“ Probably because the house is burning and someone 
is killing your master,” answered my uncle, tranquilly ; 
and, whistling to Gaspard, who Avas lingering in Ihe 
rear, he contintted on his way. 

The weather had grown milder. The sky, so bright 
but a little while before, had become a dull and dirty 
white, like a gypsum ceiling before it is dry. A fine, 
thick, piercing rain Avas falling, streaming in little drops 
along the stripped branches, and making the trees and 
bushes Aveep. 

My uncle’s hat drank in this rain like a sponge, and 
soon its tAvo corners became tAVO spouts from which 
black Avater poured upon his shoulders. Benjamin, 
anxious about his coat, turned it inside out, and, re- 
membering his sister’s injunction, he ordered Gaspard 
to do the same. The latter, forgetting Saint Martin, 
conformed to my uncle’s command. 

A little distance farther on, Benjamin and Gaspard 
met a troop of peasants returning from vespers. At 


164 


]Vr5r UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


sight of the saint on Gaspard’s coat, with his head down 
and his horse with all four feet in the air, as if he had 
fallen from the sky, the rustics first burst into loud 
shouts of laughter, and then their laughter turned to 
hisses. You know my uncle well enough to believe 
that he Avould not allow such a crowd to make sport of 
him with impunity. He drew his sword ; Gaspard, on 
his side, armed himself with stones, and, carried away 
by his ardor, led the attack. My uncle then saw that 
Saint Martin was the only party wronged in this affair, 
and he was seized with such a desire to laugh that he 
was obliged to rest on his sword to keep from falling. 

“ Gaspard,” he shouted, in a choking voice, “ patron 
saint of Glamecy, your saint is upside down, your saint’s 
helmet is falling off.” 

Gaspard, understanding that he was the object of all 
this mirth, could not endure this humiliation ; he took 
off his coat, threw it on the ground, and trampled on it 
with his feet. When my uncle had finished laughing, 
he tried to force him to pick it up and put it on again : 
but Gaspard ran away across the fields, and was seen no 
more. Benjamin pitifully picked up the coat and put 
it on the end of his sword. In the meantime M. Su- 
surrans came up. He had sobered off a little, and re- 
membered very distinctly that he had eaten his chickens ; 
but he had lost his three-cornered hat. Benjamin, who 
was much amused at the little man’s vivacity, and who 
wished, as we professors say, people of evil associations 
and low tone, to get him a little rattled, maintained 
that he had eaten his hat; but Benjamin’s muscular 
strength had impressed itself so forcibly upon Susurrans 
that he squarely refused to take offence ; he even pushed 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


165 


his obstinacy to the point of making apologies to my 
uncle. 

Benjamin and M. Susurrans returned to Clamecy 
together. Toward the middle of the faubourg they met 
lawyer Page. 

“ Where are you going? ” said the latter to my uncle. 

“ Why, you must see for yourself ; I am going to my 
dear sister’s to dine.” 

“ Not at all,” said Page ; “ you are going to dine with 
me at the Hotel du Dauphin.” 

“ And if I accept, to what circumstance shall I owe 
this advantage ? ” 

“ I will explain that to you in a word. A wealthy 
wood merchant of Paris, for whom I have won an im- 
portant case, has invited me to dine with his attorney, 
whom he does not know. We are in the midst of the 
carnival ; I have decided that you shall be his attorney, 
and I was on my way to notify you. It is an adventure 
worthy of us, Benjamin, and I undoubtedly Rave not 
presumed too much upon your genius in hoping that 
you would play a part in it.” 

“It is, indeed,” said Benjamin, “ a well-conceived 
masquerade. But I do not know,” he added, laughing, 
“ whether honor and delicacy will permit me to play the 
part of the attorney.” 

“ At table,” said Page, “ the most honest man is the 
man who most conscientiously empties his glass.” 

“ Yes, but suppose your wood merchant should talk 
to me about his case ? ” 

“ I will answer for you.” 

“ And suppose to-morrow he should take it into his 
head to pay a visit to his attorney? ” 


166 


IklY tJISICLE BENJAMIK. 


“ It is to you that I will take him.” 

“That’s all very well, but I haven’t an attorney’s 
phiz ; at least I so flatter myself.” 

“You shall assume it; you have already succeeded in 
passing yourself off for the Wandering Jew.” 

“ And my red coat ? ” 

“ Our man is an idler from Paris ; we will make him 
believe that in the provinces a red coat is a part of an 
attorney’s insignia.” 

“ And my sword ? ” 

“ If he notices it, you will tell him that you cut your 
pens with that.” 

“ But who then is your wood merchant’s attorney ? ” 

“ Dulciter. Would you be so inhuman as to let me 
dine with Dulciter? ” 

“ I know very well that Dulciter is not amusing ; 
but, if he should know that I had dined in his place, he 
would sue me for damages.” 

“ I will plead your cause ; come, I am sure that dinner 
is ready; but, by the way, our host urged me to bring 
with me Dulciter’s head clerk: Avhere the devil am I 
to find. a clerk for Dulciter?” 

Benjamin burst into a mad laugh. 

“ Oh ! ^’ he shouted, clapping his hands, “ I have it ! 
Stay,” he added, putting his hand on the shoulder of 
M. Susurrans, “ here is your clerk.” 

“ Oh, fie ! ” said Page, “ a grocer? ” 

“ What difference does that make ? ” 

“ He smells of cheese.” 

“ You are not an epicure, Page ; he smells of can- 
dles.” 

“ But he is sixty years old.” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 167 

“We will introduce him as the Nestor of the cor- 
poration.” 

“You are rogues and good-for-nothings,” said M. 
Susurrans, his impetuous character coming to the front 
again ; “I am not a bandit, nor a frequenter of wine- 
shops.” 

“ No,” interrupted my uncle; “he gets drunk alone 
in his cellar.” 

“ Possibly, Monsieur Rath ery, but at any rate I do 
not get drunk at the expense of others, and I will not 
take part in your filibustering projects.” 

“But you must at any rate,” said my uncle, “take 
part this- evening ; otherwise I will tell everybody where 
I hung you.” 

“ And where then did you hang him ? ” said Page. 

“ Imagine,” said Benjamin . . . 

“ Monsieur Rathery,” cried Susurrans, putting a 
finger over his mouth. 

“ Well, do you consent to come with us ? ” 

“ Why, Monsieur Rathery, consider that my wife is 
waiting for me ; they will think me dead, murdered ; 
they will institute a search for me on the road to Val- 
des-Rosiers.” 

“So much the better; perhaps they will find your 
three-cornered hat.” 

“ Monsieur Rathery, my good Monsieur Rathery ! ” 
exclaimed Susurrans, clasping his hands. 

“Well, then,” said my uncle, “don’t be childish! 
You owe me a reparation, and I owe you a dinner ; at 
one stroke we shall cancel our mutual obligations.” 

“ At least let me go tell my wife.” 

“No,” said Benjamin, placing himself between him 


168 


MY XJXCLE BEKJAMIi^. 


and Page ; “ I know Madame Susurrans from having 
seen her at her counter. She would put you under 
lock and key, and I do not wish you to escape us : I 
would not give you for ten pistoles.” 

“And my keg,” said Susurrans, “what am I going 
to do with that now that I am an attorney’s clerk ? ” 

“It is true,” said Benjamin, “you cannot present 
yourself at our client’s with a keg.” 

They were then in the middle of the Beuvron bridge ; 
my uncle took the keg from the hands of Susurrans and 
threw it into the river. 

“ Rascal of a Rathery 1 knave of a Rathery ! ” cried 
Susurrans ; “ you shall pay me for my keg ; it cost me 
six francs ; but you shall know what it will cost you.” 

“M. Susurrans,” said Benjamin, assuming a majestic 
attitude, “let us imitate the sage who said: Omnia 
mecum porto ; that is, everything that hinders me I 
throw into the river. See, there at the end of this sword 
is a magnificent coat, my nephew’s S unday coat ; a coat 
which might figure in a museum, and which cost for the 
making alone thirty times as much as your miserable 
keg. W ell, I sacrifice it without the slightest regret ; 
throw it over the bridge, and we shall be quits.” 

As M. Susurrans was unwilling to do anything of the 
kind, Benjamin threw the coat over the bridge, and, 
taking Page’s arm and that of Susurrans, he said : 

“Now let us be off; they can raise the curtain; we 
are ready to go upon the stage.” 

But man proposes and God disposes. As they were 
going up the steps of Vieille-Rome, they met Madame 
Susurrans face to face. Not seeing her husband return, 
she had started out to meet him with a lantern. When 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


169 


she saw him between my uncle and lawyer Page, both 
of whom had a suspicious reputation, her anxiety gave 
place to anger. 

“ At last. Monsieur, here you are ! ” she cried ; “ it is 
really fortunate ; I began to think that you were not^ 
coming home to-night; you are leading a pretty life, 
and setting a fine example to your son.” 

Then, surveying her husband with a rapid glance, she 
saw how incomplete he was. 

“ And your chickens. Monsieur ! and your hat, 
wretch ! and your keg, drunkard I What have you 
done with them?” 

“Madame,” responded Benjamin, gravely, “we have 
eaten the chickens ; as for the three-cornered hat, he 
has had the misfortune to lose it in the road.” 

“ What ! the monster has lost his three-cornered hat ! 
a three-cornered hat that had just been done over ! ” 

“ Yes, Madame, he has lost it, and you are very fort- 
unate, considering the position which he occupied, that 
he did not lose his wig as well ; as for the keg, the cus- 
toms officials seized it, and they have reported the of- 
fence.” 

As Page could not help laughing, Mme. Susurrans 
said : 

“ I see how it is ; you have debauched my husband, 
and you are laughing at us besides. You would be in 
much better business attending to your patients and 
paying your debts. Monsieur Pathery.” 

“ Do I owe you anything, Madame ? ” replied my 
uncle, proudly. 

“ Yes, my dear,” broke in Susurrans, feeling strong 
under his wife’s protection, “ he debauched me ; he and 


170 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


his nephew ate my chickens; they took my three-cor- 
nered hat and threw my keg into the river; he tried 
also, infamous man that he is, to force me to go to dine 
with him at the Dauphin and to play at my age the 
j)art of an attorney’s clerk.” 

“ Away, base man ! I am going at once to warn M. 
Dulciter that you intend to dine in his place and in 
that of his clerk.” _ 

“You see, Madame,” said my uncle, “that your hus- 
band is drunk and doesn’t know what he is talking 
about ; if you take my advice, you will put him to bed 
as soon as you reach the house, and give him every two 
hours a decoction of camomile and lime-tree flowers: 
while holding him up, I had occasion to feel his pulse, 
and I assure you that he is not at all well.” 

“ Oh ! you rascal 1 Oh ! you knave I Oh ! you revolu- 
tionist! You dare to tell my wife that I am sick from 
having drunk too much, whereas it is you who are 
drunk! Wait, I am going to Dulciter’s at once, and 
you will hear from him directly.” 

“ You must see, Madame,” said Page, with the utmost 
sang-froid^ “ that this man is talking wildly : you would 
be false to all your wifely duties if you should not make 
your husband take camomile and lime-tree flowers, ac- 
cording to the prescription of M. Rathery, who is surely 
the most skilful doctor in the bailiwick, and who an- 
swers this madman’s insults by saving his life.” 

Susurrans was about to renew his curses. 

“ Come,” his wife said to him, “ I see that these gen- 
tlemen are right: you are so drunk that you cannot 
talk; follow me directly, or I will lock you out, and 
you will sleep wherever you can,” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


171 


“That’s right,” said Page and my uncle together, 
and they were still laughing when they reached the 
door of the Dauphin. The first person whom they met 
in the yard was M. Minxit, who was mounting his 
horse to return to Corvol. 

“ Stay,” said my uncle, seizing his horse’s bridle, 
“ you shall not leave here to-night. Monsieur Minxit ; 
you are going to sup with us ; we have lost one guest, 
but you are worth thirty of him.” 

“ If that will please you, Benjamin . . . Hostler, 
take my horse back to the stable, and tell them to pre- 
pare a bed for me.” 


CHAPTER XIII. 


- HOW MY UNCLE SPENT THE NIGHT IN PRAYER FOR HIS 
sister’s safe DELIVERY. 

My time is precious, dear readers, and I suppose 
that yours is no less so; I shall not amuse myself 
therefore in describing to you this memorable supper ; 
you know the guests well enough to form an idea of 
the way in which they supped. My uncle left the 
Hotel du Dauphin at midnight, advancing three steps 
and retiring two, like certain pilgrims of former times 
who vowed to go to Jerusalem by that method. On 
entering the house, he saw a light in Machecourt’s 
chamber; and, supposing that his brother-in-law was 
scribbling off some writ, he went in with the intention 
of bidding him good-night. My grandmother was in 
the pains of child-birth ; the midwife, frightened at my 
uncle’s unexpected appearance at this hour, came to 
officially notify him of the event that was about to take 
place. Benjamin remembered, through the mists that 
obscured his brain, that his sister, during the first year 
of her marriage, had had a very painful delivery which 
endangered her life: immediately he melted into two 
tear-spouts. 

“ Alas ! ” he cried, in a voice -loud enough to waken 
the entire Rue des Moulins, “ my dear sister is going 
to die ; Mas ! she is going ” . . . 

“ Madame Lalande,” cried my grandmother from her 
bed, “ put that dog of a drunkard out doors.” 


17 ? 


MY TOCLE BENJAmK. 


173 


“Retire, Monsieur Rathery,” said Madame Lalande, 
“ there is not the slightest danger ; the child presents 
itself by tile shoulders, and in an hour your sister will 
be delivered.” 

But Benjamin still cried : “ Alas ! my dear sister is 
going to die.” 

Machecourt, seeing that the midwife’s remarks had 
no effect, thought it his duty to intervene.' 

“ Yes, Benjamin, my friend, my good brother, the 
child presents itself by the shoulders ; do me the favor 
to go to bed, I beg of you.” 

So spoke my grandfather. 

“ And you, Machecourt, my friend, my good brother,” 
answered my uncle, “ I beg of you, do me the favor to 

go ” . . . 

My grandmother, seeing that she could not count on 
Machecourt to take any decisive step with Benjamin, 
decided to put him out doors herself. 

With lamblike docility my uncle suffered himself to 
be pushed outside. His mind was soon made up : he 
decided to go sleep beside Page, who was snoring like a 
blacksmith’s bellows on one of the tables at the Dau- 
phin. Bat, as he was passing by the church, the idea 
occurred to him to pray to God for his dear sister’s safe 
delivery ; now the weather had grown very cold again, 
and the temperature was several degrees below freez- 
ing. Notwithstanding this, Benjamin knelt on the 
steps of the church-front, joined his hands as he had 
seen them do at his dear sister’s, and began to mumble 
some bits of prayer. As he was beginning his second 
Ave^ sleep took possession of him, and he began to snore 
like his friend Page. The next morning at five o’clock} 

3S 


174 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


when the sexton came to ring the “ Angelas,” he saw 
something kneeling like a human form. At first he 
imagined in his simplicity that some saint had left his 
niche to do penance, and he began to get ready to take 
him back into the church ; hut, on coming closer, the 
light of his lantern enabled him to recognize my uncle^ 
who had an inch of frost on his hack and an icicle on 
the end of his nose half an ell in length. 

“ Hello, Monsieur Rathery ! Hello ! ” he shouted in . 
Benjamin’s ear. 

As my uncle did not ansAver, he Avent calmly to ring 
his “Angelas,” and, when he had finished and Avell 
finished, he came back to M. Rathery. In case that he 
might not be dead, he took him on his shoulders like a 
sack and carried him to his sister’s. My grandmother 
had been delivered tAvo good hours ; the neighbors who 
had spent the night by her side transferred their cares 
to Benjamin. They placed him on a mattress before 
the fire, wrapped him in Avarm toAvels and blankets, and 
placed a hot brick at his feet ; in the excess of • their 
zeal, they Avould Avillingly have put him in the oven. 
My uncle thawed out gradually ; his cue, which was as 
stiff as his SAvord, began to Aveep on the bolster, his 
joints relaxed, the poAver of speech returned to him, and 
the first use that he made of it was to call for hot wine. 
Tliey quickly made him a kettleful ; Avhen he had 
drunk half of it, he Avas taken with such a SAveat that 
they thought he Avas going to liquefy. He SAvallowed 
the rest, went to sleep, and at, eight o’clock in the morn- 
ing was as well as anybody. If the priest had made an 
official report of these facts, my uncle Avould surely have 
been canonized. They probably would have given him 


MY UKCLE BENJAJ^IIN. 175 

to the tavern-keepers for their patron saint ; and it may- 
be said, without flattering him, that, with his cue and 
his red coat, he would have made a magnificent tavern- 
sign. 

INIore than a week had passed since my grandmother’s,, 
safe delivery, and already she was thinking of her 
churching. This sort of quarantine imposed by the 
canons of the church involved serious inconveniences 
to her in particular and to the whole family in general. 
In the first place, when any rather striking event — 
some bit of scandal, for instance — ruffled the smooth 
surface of the neighborhood, she could not go to gossip 
with her neighbor in the Rue des Moulins, which to 
her was a cruel privation ; further, she was obliged to 
send Gaspard to the market and the butcher’s, wrapped 
in a kitchen-apron. Now, when Gaspard lost the dinner- 
money playing quoits, or when he brought home a scrag 
of mutton instead of a leg, or when, on being sent to 
get a cabbage to put in the kettle, he did not return 
until after the soup was done, Benjamin laughed, Mache- 
court swore, and my grandmother whipped Gaspard. 

“ Why,” said my grandfather one day, irritated at 
being obliged, in consequence of Gaspard’s absence, to 
eat a calf’s head without shallots, “ do you not do your 
work yourself ? ” 

“ Why ! Why ! ” replied my grandmother “ because 
I cannot go to mass without paying Mine. Lalande.” 

“ Why the devil, then, dear sister,” said Benjamin, 
“ did you not wait till you had some money before giv- 
ing birth to your child ? ’^’ • 

“Ask rather your imbecile brother-in-law why he has 
not brought me six francs for a month.” 


176 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“So then,” said Benjamin, “ if you were to go six 
months without receiving money, for six months you 
would remain shut up in your house as in a lazaretto ? ” 

“Yes,” replied my grandmother, “because if I should 
go out before I had been to mass, the priest would de- 
nounce me from the pulpit and the people would point 
their fingers at me in the streets.” 

“ In that case you should call on 'the priest to send 
you his housekeeper to perform your household duties ; 
for God is too just to require Machecourt to eat calf’s 
head without shallots simply because you have given 
him a seventh child.” 

Happily the six francs so impatiently awaited arrived 
accompanied by a few others, and my grandmother was 
able to go to mass. 

On re-entering the house with -Mine. Lalande, she 
found my uncle stretched out in Machecourt’s leather 
arm-chair, his heels resting on the andirons and a por- 
ringer full of hot wine in front of him ; for I must tell 
you that, since his convalescence, Benjamin, grateful to 
the hot wine that had saved his life, took enough of it 
every morning to satisfy two naval officers. To justify 
.this tremendous extra allowance, he said that his tem- 
perature was still below zero. 

“ Benjamin,” said my grandmother, “ I have a service 
to ask of you.” 

“ A service ! ” answered Benjamin, “ and what can I 
do, dear sister, to be agreeable to you ? ” 

“ You ought to be able to guess, Benjamin ; you must 
stand godfather to my last child.” 

Benjamin, who had guessed nothing at all, and whom 
this proposition took entirely unawares, shook his head 
and uttered a big : “ But ” . . , 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


177 


‘‘ What ! ” said my grandmother, looking at him with 
flashing eyes, “ is it possible that you would refuse me 
that?” 

“No, dear sister, quite the contrary, but” . . . 

“ But what? You begin to make me impatient with 
your huts.” 

“ W ell, you see, I have never been a godfather, and 
I should not know how to perform my functions.” 

“ Fine difficulty, that ! You will be told what to do ; 
I will ask cousin Guillaumot to give you some lessons.” 

“ I doubt neither the talent nor the zeal of cousin 
Guillaumot ; but, if it is necessary for me to take les- 
sons in the science of being a godfather, I fear that this 
study is not suited to my style of intelligence ; perhaps 
you would do better to take a well-informed godfather 
at the start ; Gaspard, for instance, who is a choir boy, 
would suit you perfectly.” 

“ Come, Monsieur Kathery,” said Madame Lalande, 
“ you must accept your sister’s invitation ; it is a family 
duty from which you cannot be exempted.” 

“ I see how it is, Madame Lalande,” said Benjamin ; 
“ although I am not rich, I have the reputation of doing 
things well, and you would as willingly deal with me as 
with Gaspard, isn’t that it ? ” 

“ Oh, fie 1 Benjamin. Oh, fie 1 Monsieur Rathery,” 
exclaimed my grandmother and Madame Lalande 
together. 

“ See, my dear sister,” continued Benjamin, “ to be 
frank with you, I am not anxious to be a godfather. 
I am very willing to behave toward my nephew as if I 
had held him over the baptismal fonts; I will listen 
with satisfaction to the compliment that he shall ad- 


178 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


dress me every year on my birthday, and, though it 
should be in the style of Millot-Rataut, I promise to 
think it charming. I will permit him to kiss me every 
New Year’s Pa}^, and I will give him for his present 
a Punchinello that goes with a spring or a pair of 
breeches, just as you prefer. I will even feel flattered 
if you name him Benjamin. But to go plant myself 
like a big imbecile in front of the baptismal fonts, with 
a candle in my hand, oh, no, dear sister, do not ask that 
of me ; my manly dignity is opposed to it ; I should be 
afraid that Djhiarcos would laugh in my face. And 
besides, how can I declare that the squalling young one 
renounces Satan and his works ? Do I know whether 
he renounces Satan and his works ? What proves to 
me that he renounces tlie works of Satan? If the 
responsibility of a godfather is only a sham, as some 
think, of what use is a godfather, of what use is a god- 
mother, of what use are two securities instead of one, 
and why have my signature indorsed by another ? If, 
on the contrary, this responsibility is serious, why 
should I incur the consequences? Our soul being the 
most precious thing that we have, must not one be 
mad to put it in pawn for that of another? And 
besides, what makes you in such a hurry to have your 
infant baptized ? Is it a terrine of foie gras or a May- 
ence ham which would spoil if it were not salted at 
once? Wait until he is twenty-five; then at least he 
will be able to answer for himself, and, if he needs a 
security, I shall know what I have to do. Until he is 
eighteen, your son will not be able to enlist in the 
army; until he is twenty-one, he will not be able to 
make a civil contract ; until he is twenty-five, he wfill 


ISry UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


179 


not be able to marry witliont your consent and M ache- 
court’s ; and yet you expect him at the age of nine days 
to have sufficient discrimination to choose a reliofion. 
Nonsense ! you can see for yourself that that is not 
reasonable.” 

“ Oh, my dear lady,” cried the nurse, frightened at 
my uncle’s heterodox logic, “ your brother is one of the 
damned. Take good care not to let him stand god- 
father to your child; it would bring misfortune.” 

“ Madame Lalande,” said Benjamin, in a severe tone, 
“a course in midwifery is not a course in logic. It 
would be cowardly on my part to discuss with you ; I 
will content myself with asking you whether Saint 
John baptized in the Jordan, in consideration of a ses- 
terce and a cornet of dried dates, the neophytes brought 
him from Jerusalem on their nurses’ arms.” 

“Indeed!” said Madame Lalande, embarrassed by 
the objection, “ I would rather believe it than go there 
to see.” 

“ What, Madame, you would rather believe it than 
go there to see I Is that the proper language for a mid- 
wife well-informed in her religion? Well, since you 
take that air, I will do myself the honor to confront 
you with this dilemma” . . . 

“ Let us alone with your dilemmas,” interrupted my 
grandmother; “does Madame Lalande know what a 
dilemma is?” 

“ What, Madame ! ” exclaimed the nurse, piqued at 
my grandmother’s observation, “ I do not know what a 
dilemma is? I, the wife of a surgeon, do not know 
what a dilemma is? Go on. Monsieur Rathery, I am 
listening to you.” 


180 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“It is entirely useless,” replied my grandmother, 
dryly ; “ I have decided that Benjamin shall be god- 
father, and godfather he shall be ; there is no dilemma 
in the world that can exempt him from* it.” 

“ I appeal to Machecourt,” cried Benjamin. 

“Machecourt has condemned you in advance: he 
went this morning to Corvol to invite Mile. Minxit to 
be godmother.” 

“ So then,” cried my uncle, “ they dispose of me with- 
out my consent; they have not even the honesty to 
forewarn me. Do they take me for a stuffed man, for 
a gingerbread man ? A fine figure I shall cut with my 
five feet nine inches beside the five feet three inches 
of Mile. Minxit, who, with her flat and calibrated figure, 
will look like a greased Maypole crowned with ribbons. 
Do you know that the idea of going to church side by 
side with her has tormented me for the last six months, 
and that the repugnance excited in me by this disagree- 
able duty has almost made me renounce the advantage 
of becoming her husband? ” 

“Do you see, Madame Lalande,” said my grand- 
mother, “how facetious this Benjamin is? He loves 
Mile. Minxit passionately, and yet he must laugh at 
her.” 

“ Hum ! ” said the nurse. 

Benjamin, who had forgotten Madame Lalande, saw 
that he had been guilty of a lapsus linguce ; to escape 
his sister’s reproaches, he hastened to declare that he 
consented to anything that they might require of him, 
and ran away before the nurse had gone. 

The baptism was to take place the following Sunday ; 
my grandmother had dressed herself especially for the 


My ukcle BENjAi^iiisr. 


I8l 


ceremony ; she had authorized Machecourt to invite all 
his friends and those of my uncle to a solemn dinner. 
As for Benjamin, he was in a position to meet the ex- 
pense that the magnificent role of godfather called for:- 
he had just received from the government a present of 
a hundred francs for the zeal which he had displayed in 
propagating inoculation in the country, and in rehabili- 
tating the potato, attacked at once by the agriculturists 
and the physicians. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

MY uncle’s speech BEFORE THE BAILIFF. 

Ox the following Saturday, the day before the bap- 
tismal ceremony, my uncle was cited to appear before 
the bailiff to hear himself sentenced under penalty of 
imprisonment to pay Monsieur Bonteint the sum of 
one hundred and fifty francs ten sous six deniers for 
merchandise sold to him; so it was expressed in the 
summons, the cost of which was four francs five sous. 
Any other than my uncle would have deplored his fate 
in all the tones of elegy ; but the soul of this great man 
was inaccessible to the buffets of fortune. The whirl- 
wind of misery which society raises about itself, the 
vapor of tears in which it is enveloped, could not rise 
to his height ; his body was down deep in the mire of 
humanity: when he had drunk too much, he had a 
headache ; when he had walked too far, he was tired ; 
when the road was muddy, he splashed himself up to 
his neck ; and, when he had no money to pay his score, 
the inn-keeper charged it on his ledger ; but, like the 
rock whose base is beaten by the waves and whose 
brow is radiant in the sunlight, like the bird which has 
its nest in the thickets by the wayside and lives amid 
the azure of the skies, his soul soared in an upper 
region, always calm and serene ; he had but two needs, 

• — the satisfaction of liunger and thirst, — and, if the 
firmament had fallen in pieces upon the earth, and 
had left one bottle intact, my uncle would have i 
182 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


183 


calmly emptied it to tlie resurrection of tlie crushed 
human race, standing on a smoking fragment of some 
star. To him the past was nothing, and the future was 
nothing as yet. lie compared the past to an empty 
bottle, and the future to a chicken ready for the spit. 

AVliat care I,” said he, “ what sort of liquor the bottle 
contained ? And as for the chicken, why should f roast 
myself in turning it round and round before the fire ? 
Perhaps when it is cooked to a turn, when the table is 
laid, and when I liave put my napkin on, some dog will 
come along and carry away the smoking fowl between 
his teeth. 

‘ Eternite, neant, bass^, sombres abimes ! ’ 

cries the poet ; for my part, all that I should try to 
save from the gloomy abyss would be my last red coat 
if it floated within my reach; life is entirely in the 
present, and the present is the passing moment ; now, 
what to me is the happiness or the sorrow of a mo- 
ment ? Here is a beggar and there a millionaire ; God 
says to them : ‘You have but a minute to remain upon 
earth ’ ; this minute gone, he grants them a second, then 
a third, and makes them live on thus to the age of 
ninety years. Do you think that one is really happier 
than the other ? Man himself is the artisan of all the 
miseries that afflict him ; the pleasures which he con- 
trives are not worth a quarter of tlie trouble that he 
takes to acquire them. He is like a hunter who scours 
the country all day long for an emaciated hare or a 
partridge’s body. We boast of the superiority of our 
intelligence, but Avhat matters it that we can measure 
the course of the stars, that we can tell almost to a sec- 


184 


MY UITCLE BENJA]Vn>T. 


one! at what hour the moon Avill pass between the earth 
and the sun, that we can traverse the solitudes of the 
ocean With wooden boats or hempen sails, if we do not 
know how to enjoy the blessings which God has placed 
in our existence. The animals whom we insult with 
the name of brutes know how to take life much better 
than we do. The ass rolls about in the grass and eats 
it, without troubling himself about whether it will grow 
again ; the bear does not go to guard a farmer’s flocks 
in order to have mittens and a fur cap in the Avinter ; 
the hare does not become the diuimmer of a regiment in 
the hope of laying up provisions for his old age ; the 
tulture does not seek a position as a letter-carrier in 
order to Avear a beautiful gold necklace around its bare 
neck: all are content AAuth Avhat nature has given 
them, with the bed .AAdiich she has prepared for them in 
the grass of the forests, Avith the roof Avhich she has 
made for them Avith the stars and the azure of the 
firmament. 

“ As soon as a ray lights on the plain, the bird begins 
to twitter on its branch, the insect hums around, the 
bushes, the fish leaps to the surface of its pool, the 
lizard lounges on the Avarm stones of the ruin it in- 
habits ; if some shoAver falls from the clouds, each takes 
refuge in its asylum and- sleeps there peacefully Avhile 
Avaiting for the morrow’s sun. Why does not man do 
likewise ? 

“ May it not displease the great King Solomon, the anfc 
is the stupidest of animals: instead of enjoying itself 
during the fine Aveather in the fields, and getting its 
share of that magnificent festival Avhich lieaA^en for the 
space of six months gives the earth, it AA^astes all its 


MY UNCLE BENJAINIIN. 


185 


summer m piling one upon another little scraps of 
leaves ; then, when its city is finished, a passing wind 
sweeps it away with its wing.” 

So Benjamin got Bonteint’s process-server di*unk and 
used the stamped paper of the summons to wrap some 
ointment in. 

The bailiff before whom my uncle was to appear was 
so important a personage that I must not neglect to 
give you his portrait. Besides, my grandfather on Ids 
death-bed expressly urged me to do so, and for nothing 
in the world would I fail in this pious duty. 

The bailiff, then, was born, like so many others, of 
poor parents. Ilis first swaddling-clothes were cut out 
of a gendarme s old cloak, and' he began his studies' in 
jurisprudence by cleaning his father’s big sword and 
currying his red horse. I cannot explain to you how, 
from the lowest rank of the judicial hierarchy, the 
bailiff rose to the highest judicial position in the neigh- 
borhood ; all that I can tell you is that the lizard as 
well as the eagle reaches the peaks of the high rocks. 

Among other fancies the bailiff had a mania for being 
a grand personage. The inferiority of his origin was 
his despair. He could not conceive how it was that a 
man like himself was not born a gentleman. He attrib- 
uted it to an error of the Creator. He would have 
given his wife, his children, and his clerk for the tiniest 
coat of arms. Nature had been to the bailiff a good 
mother enough ; in truth, she had given him his share 
of intelligence, neither too much nor too little, but she 
had added to this a large dose of craft and audacity. 
The bailiff was neither stupid nor witty. He lingered 
on the borderland of the two camps : with this differ- 


186 


]MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


ence, however, — that he had never set foot in that of 
the people of wit, whereas he had made frequent excur- 
sions into the easy and open territory of the other. 
Unable to have the wit of bright men, the bailiff had 
contented himself Avith that of fools : he made puns. 
The laAvyers and their Avives made it a duty to consider 
these puns very funny; his clerk Avas charged with 
spreading them among the people, and eA^en with ex- 
plaining them to those dull minds Avhich at first failed 
to understand their meaning. Thanks to this agreeable 
social talent, the bailiff had acquired in a certain circle 
a reputation as a man of Avit ; but my uncle said that 
he purchased this imputation with counterfeit? coin. 

Was the bailiff an honest man ? I Avould not dare to 
say tlie contrary. You knoAV the Code defines robbers, 
and society regards as honest people all those Avho are 
outside the definition ; noAV, the bailiff Avas not defined 
by tlie Code. The bailiff, by dint of intrigue, had suc- 
ceeded in managing, not only the business, but also the 
pleasures of thei toAvn. As a magistrate, the bailiff Avas 
a jiersonage not to be highly recommended ; he Under- 
stood the laAv very AAmll, but, AAdien it Avent against his 
hatreds or his sympathies, he interpreted it to suit him 
self. It Avas charged that one scale of his balance Avas 
gold and the other Avood, and, in fact, I knoAV not hoAV 
it happened, but his friends Avere ahv^ays right and his 
enemies ahvays .wrong. If they Avere arraigned for an, 
offence, the latter incurred the highest penalty of the 
laAV ; if he could have added to it, he Avould have done 
so Avith a good heart. Nevertheless the laAv cannot al- 
Avays bend : Avhen the bailiff^ found himself under the 
necessity of passing sentence upon a man Avhom he 


]VrY UNCLE BENJAJSnN. 


187 


feared or from whom he hoped something, he got out 
of the aifair by declining to sit, and thus his impartial- 
ity was a boast among his coterie. The bailiff aimed at 
universal admiration : he cordially, but secretly, detested 
those who obscured him by any superiority whatever. 
If you j)retended to believe in his importance, if you 
applied to him for protection, you made him the happi- 
est man in the Avorld ; but, if you refused to take off 
your hat to him, this insult buried itself deeply in his 
memory, and made a wound there, and, if you had lived 
a hundred years and he also, never would he have for- 
given you. So it went hard with the unfortunate felloAV 
who abstained from saluting the bailiff. If any affair 
brought liim before his tribunal, he excited him by some 
well-planned outrage to fail in respect. Then ven- 
geance became to him a duty, and he put our man in 
prison, while deploring the fatal necessity v/hich his 
functions imposed upon him. Often even, to make his 
grief seem more real, he had the hypocrisy to take to 
his bed, and on great occasions he went so far as to sub- 
mit to bleeding. 

The bailiff paid court to God as well as to the powers 
of earth ; he was never absent from high mass, and he 
always placed himself in the very middle of the vestry- 
men’s^ pew. That brought him every Sunday a share 
of the blessed bread with the protection of the priest. 
If he could have established by an official report that he 
had attended divine service, he undoubtedly would have 
done so. But these little faults were made-up for in 
the bailiff by brilliant qualities. No one understood 
better than he how to organize a ball at the expense of 
the city or a banquet in honor of the Due de Niver- 


188 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


nais. On these occasions he was magnificent in 

majesty, appetite, and puns ; Lamoignon or President 
Mol^ would have been very small men beside him. In 
reward for the eminent services that he rendered to the 
city, he had hoped for ten years to receive the cross of 
Saint Louis ; and, when Lafayette was decorated after 
his American campaigns, he loudly protested against 
the injustice. 

Such was the bailiff morally; physically he was a 
fleshy man, although he had not yet attained his full 
majesty ; his person resembled an ellipse swollen at the 
bottom; you might have compared him to an ostrich- 
egg standing on two legs. Perfidious nature, which 
beneath a fiery sky has given to the manchineel tree a 
broad and thick shade, had granted to the bailiff the 
face of an honest man. Consequently he Avas fond of 
posing, and it was a fine day in his life when he could 
go, escorted by the firemen, from the tribunal to the 
church. 

The bailiff always stood as stiff as a statue on a 
pedestal : if you had not known him, you Avould have 
said that he had a plaster of Burgundy pitch or a broad 
blister between his shoulders : he Avalked in the street 
as if he had carried a holy sacrament ; his step was as 
invariable as a yard-stick: a shower of spears would 
not have made him lengthen it an inch ; Avith the bailiff 
for his single instrument an astronomer could have 
measured an arc of the meridian. 

My uncle did not hate the bailifi ; he did not even 
deign to despise him; but, in presence of this moral 
abjection, he felt something like a revolt of his soul, 
and he sometimes said that this man had the effect upon 
him of a big toad crouching in a velvet arm-chair, 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


189 


As for the bailiff, he hated Benjamin mth all the 
energy of his bilious soul. The latter was not ignorant 
of this ; but he cared very little about it. 

My grandmother, fearing a conflict between these 
two natures so diverse, wanted Benjamin to abstain 
from going to court; but the great man, who had con- 
fidence in the strength of his will, had disdained this 
timid counsel ; only, on Saturday morning he abstained 
from taking his customary allowance of hot wine. 

Bonteint’s lawyer proved that his client had a right 
to claim a judgment against my uncle for seizure of his 
body. When he had entirely finished his demonstra- 
tion, the bailiff asked Benjamin what he had to say in 
his defence. 

“I have but one observation to make,” said my pncl^, 
“but it is worth more than Monsieur’s whole speech, 
for it is unanswerable : I am five feet nine inches above 
the level of the sea and six inches above the level of the 
ordinary man; I think” . . . 

“Monsieur Rathery,” interrupted the bailiff, “how- 
ever tall a man you may be, you have no right to joke 
with justice.” 

“ If I had a desire to joke,” said my uncle, “ it Avould 
not be with so powerful a personage as Monsieur, whose , 
justice, moreover, does not joke ; but when I affirm that 
I am five feet nine inches above the level of the sea, 

I do not perpetrate a joke ; I offer a serious defence. 
Monsieur can have me measured if he doubts the truth 
of my declaration. I think, then” . . . 

“ Monsieur Rathery,” replied the bailiff quickly, “ if 
you continue in this tone, I shall be obliged to deprive 
you of the floor.” 

13 


190 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ It is not worth Avliile,” answered my uncle, “ for I 
am done. I think, then,” he added, hurrying his syl- 
lables one after another, “ that the body of a man of my 
stature is not to be seized for fifty miserable three-franc 
pieces.” 

“ According to you,” said the bailiff, “ the seizure of 
the body could be practised only on one of your arms, 
one of your legs, or perhaps even on your cue.” 

“In the first place,” answered my uncle, “I will beg 
Monsieur to observe that my cue is not in question ; 
then 1 make no pretension to the quality attributed to 
me by Monsieur; I was born undivided, and I intend 
to remain undivided all my life ; but, as the security is 
worth at least double the amount of the credit, I beg 
Monsieur to order that the sentence for seizure of my 
body shall not be executed until Bonteint shall have 
furnished me with three more red coats.” 

“ Monsieur Rathery, this is not a tavern ; I beg you 
to remember to whom you are talking ; your remarks 
are as ill-considered as your person.” 

“ Monsieur bailiff,” answered my uncle, “ I have a 
good memory, and I know very well to whom I am 
talking. I have been too carefully brought up by my 
dear sister in the fear of God and the gendarmes to 
allow me to forget it. As for the tavern, since you 
have brought up the question of the tavern, it is too 
highly appreciated by honest people to need to be 
rehabilitated by me. If we go to the tavern, it is be- 
cause, when we are thirsty, we have not the privilege 
of refreshing ourselves at the expense of the city. The 
tavern is the wine-cellar of those who have none ; and 
the wine-cellar of those who have one is nothing but a 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


191 


tavern without a sign. It ill becomes those who drink 
a bottle of Burgundy and something else for their 
dinner to abuse the poor devil who now and then 
regales himself at the tavern with a pint of Croi:?^- 
Pataux. Those official orgies where they get intoxi- 
cated in drinking toasts to the, king and to the Due de 
Nivernais. are simply, euphony aside, what the people 
call drinking bouts. To get drunk at one’s table is 
more decent, but to get drunk at the tavern is nobler, 
and more profitable to the public treasury besides. As 
to the consideration that attaches to my person, it is 
less extended than that which Monsieur can claim for 
his, inasmuch as I enjoy the consideration of honest 
people only. But” ... 

“Monsieur Bathery,” cried the bailiff, finding no 
better and easier answer to the epigrams with which my 
uncle was tormenting him, “ you are an insolent fellow.” 

“ So be it,” replied Benjamin, knocking off a straw 
which had attached itself to the facing of his coat, “ but 
I must in conscience warn Monsieur that I have con- 
fined myself this morning within the limits of the 
strictest temperance, and that consequently, if he should 
try to make me depart from the respect that I owe to 
his robe, he would do so at his costs of provocation.” 

“Monsieur Rathery,” exclaimed the bailiff, “your 
allusions are insulting to justice ; I fine you thirty 
sous for contempt.” 

“ There are three francs,” said my uncle, putting a 
little coin on the judge’s green table, “ take your pay out 
of that.” 

“Monsieur Rathery,” cried the exasperated bailiff, 
“ leave the room,” 


192 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ Monsieur bailiff, I have the honor to salute you. 
My compliments to Madame your wife, if you please.” 

“ I fine you forty sous more,” screamed the judge. 

“ What ! ” said my uncle, “ a fine of forty sous be- 
cause I present my compliments to Madame your wife.” 

And he went out. 

“ That devil of a man ! ” said the bailiff in the even- 
ing to his wife ; “ never would I have supposed him so 
moderate. But let him look out ; I have issued a war- 
rant for his arrest, and shall ask Bonteint to execute it 
immediately. He shall learn what it is to defy me. 
When I invite him to the festivities given by the city, 
it will be hot, and if I can diminish his practice ”... 

“ Oh, fie. Monsieur ! ” answered his wife, “ are those 
proper sentiments . to be uttered by a man who sits in 
the vestrymen’s pew ? And besides, what has M. 
Bathery done to you ? He is such a merry, handsome, 
and amiable man ! ” 

“ I will tell you what he has done to me, Madame ; 
he has dared to remind me that your father-in-law was 
a gendarme ; moreover, he is wittier and more honest 
than I. Do you think that a little matter ? ” 

The next day my uncle had ceased to think about the 
warrant issued for his arrest ; he started for the church, 
powdered and solemn. Mile. Minxit on his right and 
his sword on his left ; he was followed by Page, who 
presented a smart appearance in his brown coat; by 
Arthus, whose abdomen was enveloped to a point be- 
yond its diameter by a waistcoat figured with large 
branches, among which little birds were fluttering ; by 
Millot-Rataut, who wore a brick-colored wig, and whose 
gridelin tibias were marbled with black ; and by a great 


OT UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


19a 


many others, whose names it does not please me to 
hand down to posterity. Parian ta alone failed to an- 
swer to the call. Two violins squeaked at the head of 
the procession ; Machecourt and his wife brought up 
the rear. Benjamin, always magnificent, scattered by 
the way sugar-plums and small coins from the inocula- 
tion money. Gaspard, very proud to serve him as a 
pocket, walked by his side, carrying the sugar-plums in 
a big bag. 


CHAPTER XV. 

HOW MY UNCLE WAS ARRESTED BY PARLANTA IN THE 
PERFORMANCE OP HIS FUNCTIONS AS GODFATHER, 

AND PUT IN PRISON. 

But quite another ceremony was in store for him ! 
Paiianta had received from Bonteint and the bailiff 
express orders to execute the warrant during the cere- 
mony ; he had ambushed his assistants in the vestibule 
of the court-house, and was awaiting the procession 
himself under the portal of the church. 

As soon as he saw my uncle’s three-cornered hat 
emerge from the steps of Vieille-Rome, he went up to 
him and summoned him in the name of the king to fol- 
low him to prison. 

“ Parlanta,” answered my uncle, “ your conduct is 
hardly conformable to the rules of French politeness; 
could you not wait until to-morrow to effect my confis- 
cation, and come^ to-day to dine with us ? ” 

“If you are very desirous of it,” said Parlanta, “I 
will wait ; but I warn you that the bailiff’s orders are 
explicit, and that I run a risk, if I disregard them, of 
incurring his resentment in this life and in the other.” 

“That being the case, do your duty,” said Benjamin; 
and he went to ask Page to take his place beside Mile. 
Minxit ; then, boAving to the latter Avith all the grace 
that his five feet nine inches Avould alloAv, he said : 

“You see. Mademoiselle, that I am forced to separate 
from you ; I beg you to believe that nothing less than 

194 


1S^Y UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


195 


a summons in the name of His Majesty could induce 
me to do such a thing. I should have liked, if Parlanta 
had allowed me, to enjoy the pleasure of this ceremony 
to the end; but these sheriff’s officers are like death: 
they seize their prey wherever they find it, they tear it 
violently from the arms of the loved one as a child tears 
a butterfly by its gauze wings from the calyx of a rose.” 

“ It is as disagreeable to me as to you,” said Mile. 
Minxit, pouting frightfully: “your friend is a little 
man and as round as a ball, and he wears a wig d mar- 
teaux ; I shall look like a Maypole beside him.” 

“What do you expect me to do? ’’said Benjamin, 
dryly, wounded at so much egoism ; “ I cannot make 
you any shorter, or M. Page any thinner, and I cannot 
lend him my cue.”. . 

Benjamin took leave of the company and followed 
Parlanta, whistling his favorite air : 

“ Malbrough s’en va-t-en guerre.” 

He halted a moment on the threshold of the prison 
to cast a last glance at the free spaces which were about 
to close behind him; he saw his sister motionless on 
the arm of her husband, who was following him with 
a distressed look; on seeing this, he pulled the door 
violently after him, and rushed into the prison-yard. 

That night my grandfather and his wife came to see 
him; they found him perched at the top of a flight of 
steps, throwing to his companions in captivity the bal- 
ance of his sugar-plums,^ and laughing like the happiest 
of men to see them scramble for them. 

“ What the devil are you doing there ? ” said my 
grandfather to him. 


196 


MY t^KCLB BENJAMIN. 


“You see for yourself,” answered Benjamin, “T am 
finishing the ba2)tismal ceremony. Do you not find 
that these men swarming at our feet to pick up insipid 
sweetmeats faithfully represent society? Is it not in 
this way that the poor inhabitants of this earth push 
each other, crush each other, overturn each other, to 
get the blessings that God has cast in the midst of 
them ? Is it not thus that the strong man tramples the 
weak man under his feet, thus that the weak man 
bleeds and cries, thus that he who has taken everything 
insults by his superb irony him to whom he has left 
nothing, and thus finally that, when the latter dares to 
complain, the other kicks him ? These poor devils are 
breathless, covered with sweat ; their fingers are bruised, 
and their faces torn ; not one has come out of the 
struggle without a scratch of some kind. If they had 
listened to their real interests rather than to their wild 
instinct of greed, instead of disputing over these sugar- 
plums as enemies, would they not have shared them as 
brothers ? ” 

“Possibly,” answered Machecourt; “but try not to 
get too lonesome this evening and to sleep well to-night, 
for to-morrow morning you will be free.” 

“ How so ? ” answered Benjamin. 

“ Because,” replied Machecourt, “ to get you out of 
this difficulty, we have sold our little vineyard.” 

“And is the contract signed?” inquired Benjamin, 
anxiously. 

“Not yet,” said my grandfather, “but we are to meet 
to-night to sign it.” 

“Well, you, Machecourt, and you, my dear sister, 
pay careful attention to what I am going to say : if you 


MY TJNCLE BENJAMIN. 


19T 


sell your vineyard to get me out of Bonteint’s clutches, 
the first use that I shall make of my liberty will be to 
leave your house, and never in all your life will you 
see me again.” 

“Nevertheless,” said Machecourt, “the matter must 
be so arranged ; one is a brother or one is not. I cannot 
allow you to remain in prison when I have in my hands 
the means of restoring your liberty. You take things 
as a philosopher, but I am not a philosopher. As long 
as you remain here, I shall be unable to eat a morsel or 
drink a glass of white wine for my benefit.” 

“ And I,” said my grandmother, “ do you think that 
I can accustom myself to see you no more ? Did not 
our mother recommend you to my care on her death- 
bed? Have I not brought you up? Do I not look 
upon you as the eldest of my children ? And these poor 
children, it is pitiable to see them ; since you are no 
longer with us, one would say there was a coffin in the 
house. They all wanted to come with us to see you, 
and little Nanette was not willing to touch her pie- 
crust, saying that she kept it for her uncle Benjamin, 
who was in prison and had only black bread to eat.” 

“This is too much,” said Benjamin, pushing my 
grandfather by the shoulders ; “ go away, Machecourt, 
and you too, my dear sister, go away, I beg of you, for 
you will cause me to be guilty of a weakness ; but, I 
warn you, if you sell your vineyard to pay my ransom, 
never in my life will I set eyes on you again.” 

“ Nonsense, you booby I ” answered my grandmother, 
“is not a brother more valuable than a vineyard? 
Would you not do for us what we do for you, if oppor- 
tunity offered ? And when you are rich, will you not 


198 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


aid US to establish our children? With your profession 
and your talents you can return us a hundred times 
over what we give you to-day. And, my God ! what 
would the public say of us if we should leave you 
behind the bars for a debt of a hundred and fifty francs ? 
Come, Benjamin, be a good brother, and do not make us 
all unhaj^py by insisting on staying here.” 

While my grandmother was speaking, Benjamin had 
his head hidden in his hands, and was trying to repress 
the tears that were gathering under his eyelids. 

“ Machecourt,” he cried suddenly, “ I can stand this 
no longer; tell Boutron to bring me a little glass of 
wine ; and come and kiss me. See,” said he, pressing 
him against his breast until he cried with pain, “ you 
are the first man .that I ever kissed, and these are the 
first tears that I have shed since the last time that I 
was flogged.” 

And truly my poor uncle burst into tears. But the 
jailer having brought two little glasses, he had no 
sooner emptied his than he became as calm and serene 
as an April sky after a shower. 

My grandmother again tried to move him, but her 
words had no more effect upon him than the moon’s 
rays upon an icicle. 

The only thing that troubled him was that the jailer 
had seen him weep. So Machecourt had to keep his 
vineyard willy-nilly. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

A BREAKFAST IK PRISOK. — HOW MY UNCLE GOT OUT OF 
PRISON. 

The next morning, as my uncle was promenading in 
the prison-yard, whistling a well-known air, Arthus 
entered, followed by three men carrying baskets cov- 
ered with white linen. 

“ Good morning, Benjamin,” he cried : “ we come to 
breakfast with you, since you can no longer come to 
breakfast with us.” 

At the same time Page, Papin, Guillerand, Millot- 
Rataut, and Machecourt marched in. Parlanta brought 
up the rear, looking a little abashed: my uncle went 
up to him, and, taking him by the hand, said : 

“Well, Parlanta, I hope you do not bear me any ill- 
will for having made you lose a good dinner yester- 
day.” 

“ On the contrary,” answered Parlanta, “ I was afraid 
that you would be angry with me for not allowing you 
to finish your baptism.” 

“ Understand this, Benjamin,” interrupted Page, “ we 
have assessed ourselves to get you out of here ; but, as 
we have no ready cash, we act as if money had not been 
invented ; we give Bonteint our respective services, 
each according to his profession.’ I will plead his first 
case for him ; Parlanta will write two summonses for 
him; Arthus will draw up his will; Papin will give 
him two or three consultations that will cost him dearer 


199 


200 MY UXCLE BENJAMIN. 

than he thinks ; Guillerand will give his children some 
grammar lessons of indifferent excellence ; Rataut, who 
is nothing, inasmuch as he is a poet, engages himself 
upon his honor to buy of him all the coats that he may 
need for the next two years, which, in my opinion and 
his, does not engage him to very much.” 

“ And does Bonteint accept ? ” said Benjamin. 

“ Accept ! ” said Page ; “ why ! he receives values 
amounting to more than five -hundred francs. Rapin 
arranged this affair with him yesterday ; it remains but 
to draw up the documents.” 

“ Well,” said my uncle, “I will take my share of this 
good deed; I engage to treat him, without any bill, 
during the next two sicknesses with which he may be 
afflicted. If I kill him with the first, his wife shall in- 
herit the privilege of the second; as for you, IVIache- 
court, I permit you to subscribe a jug of white wine.” 

Meantime Arthus had had the table set at the jailer’s. 
He took from the baskets the dishes, the contents of 
which had become somewhat mixed, and placed them in 
their order on the table. 

“Come,” he shouted, “let us sit down, and a truce 
to babbling ! I do not like to be disturbed when I am 
eating; you will have plenty of time to chatter at 
dessert.” 

The breakfast did not taste at all of the place in 
which it was celebrated. Machecourt alone was a little 
sad, for the arrangement made with Bonteint by my 
uncle’s friends seemed to him like a joke. ‘ 

“ Come, Machecourt,” cried Benjamin, “ your glass is 
always in your hand, full or empty; are you the 
prisoner here, or am I ? By the way, gentlemen, do 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


201 


you know that Machecourt came near doing a good deed 
yesterday ? He wanted to sell his good vineyard to pay 
Bonteint my ransom.” 

“ Magnificent ! ” cried Page. 

“ Succulent ! ” said Arthus. 

“ I consider it an instance of morality in action,” de- 
clared Guillerand. 

“Gentlemen,” interrupted Rapin, “virtue must be 
honored wherever one is fortunate enough to find it ; I 
propose, therefore, that every time that Machecourt sits 
down at table with us, he shall be given an arm-chair.” 

“Adopted!” cried all the guests together, “and 
here’s to Machecourt’s health ! ” 

“ Indeed I ” said my uncle, “ I do not know why 
people are so afraid of prison. Is not this fowl as 
tender, and this Bordeaux as fragrant, on this side of 
the grating as on the other ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Guillerand, “ as long as there is grass 
beside the walls to which it is fastened the goat does 
not feel its tether ; but when the place is stripped, it 
begins to worry and tries to break its tether.” 

“To go from the grass that grows in the valley,” 
answered my uncle, “ to that which grows on the moun- 
tain is the liberty of the goat ; but man’s liberty is to 
do only that which befits him. He whose body has 
been seized but "whose power to think at his will has 
been left him is a hundred times freer than he whose 
soul has been left captive in the chains of an odious 
occupation. The prisoner undoubtedly passes sad hours 
in contemplating through his bars the road that winds 
along the plain and loses itself beneath the bluish shade 
of some far-off forest. He would like to be the poor 


202 


MY UNCLE benja:min. 


woman who leads her cow along the road while twirl- 
ing her distaff, or the poor wood-cutter who goes back 
loaded with boughs to his hut smoking above the trees. 
But this liberty to be where one likes, to go straight 
ahead until one is weary or is stopped by a ditch, to 
whom does it belong ? Is not the j)aralytic in prison 
in his bed, the merchant in his shop, the clerk in his 
office, the bourgeois within the limits of his little town, 
the king within the limits of his kingdom, and God 
himself within that icy circumference which confines 
worlds? You go breathless and streaming with sweat 
over a road burned with the sun; here are tall trees 
that spread beside you their lofty tiers of verdure, and 
ironically shake their yellow leaves upon your head; 
you would like very much to remain a moment in their 
shade, and wipe your feet on the moss that carpets 
their roots; but between them and you there is six 
feet of wall or the pointed bars of an iron grating. 
Arthus, Rapin, and all of you who have only a stom- 
ach, who know how only to dine after having break 
fasted, I do not know whether you will understand me ’ 
but Millot-Rataut, who is a tailor and makes songs, he 
will understand me. I have often desired to follow in 
its vagabond peregrinations the cloud driven by the 
winds across the sky. Often when, resting my elbows 
on my window-sill, I dreamily follow the moon which 
seems to look at me like a human face, I would like to 
fly away like a bubble of air toward those mysterious 
solitudes that pass above my head, and would give all 
the world to sit for a moment on one of those gigantic 
peaks which rend the white surface of that planet. 
Was I not then also a captive on the earth as truly 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 203 

as the poor prisoner between the high walls of his 
prison? ” 

“ Gentlemen,” said Page, “ one thing must he ad- 
mitted : to the rich man the prison is made too pleasant 
and too comfortable. It corrects him like a spoiled 
child, after the fashion of that nymph who whipped 
Cupid with a rose. If you permit the rich man to 
carry to his prison his kitchen, his wine-cellar, his 
library, his parlor,^ it is~ not a condemned man whom 
you punish, it is a bourgeois who changes his lodgings- 
There you are before a good fire, wrapped in your well- 
lined dressing gown; with your feet on the andirons 
you digest your food, Avith stomach redolent with 
truffles and champagne ; the snow-flakes flutter by the 
bars of your window, while you blow toAvard the ceiling 
the white smoke of your cigar. You dream, you think, 
you build castles in Spain or write poetry. By your 
side is your newspaper, that friend Avhich we quit, 
Avhich we recall, and Avhich we finally dismiss when it 
becomes too tiresome. Tell me, Avhat is there in such 
a situation that resembles a penalty ? Have you not 
thus passed hours, days, entire Aveeks, without leaving 
your house ? What, meanwhile, is the judge doing, 
who has had the barbarity to condemn you to this 
torture? He is hearing cases from eleven o’clock in 
the morning, shivering in his black robe and listening 
to the paternosters of some lawyer who repeats himself. 
Meanwhile, catarrh with its torpid clutch seizes his 
lungs, or a chilblain with its sharp tooth bites his toes. 
You say that you are not free ! On the contrary, you 
are a hundred times freer than in your house; your 
whole day belongs to you ; you get up when you like, 


204 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


go to bed when you like, do what you like, and you are 
no longer obliged to shave. 

“ Take Benjamin, for instance, who is a prisoner : do 
you think that Bonteint has served him such a bad turn 
in getting him shut up here ? He was often obliged to 
rise before the street lamps went out. With one stock- 
ing on wrong side out, he went from door to door, to 
inspect this one’s tongue and feel that one’s pulse. 
When he had finished in one direction, he had to begin 
again in another ; he splashed himself in the cross-roads 
up to his cue, and his peasant generally had nothing to 
offer him but curds and black bread. When he had 
come home at night very tired, had settled himself com- 
fortably in his bed, and was beginning to taste the joys 
of the early hours of sleep, he was brutally awakened to 
go to the aid of the mayor choking with indigestion, or 
of the bailiff’s wife in the midst of a miscarriage. Now, 
here he is, rid of all this bustle. He is as well situated 
here as a rat in a Dutch cheese. Bonteint has made 
him a present of a little income, which he eats as a phi- 
losopher. He is really the lily of the gospel, which 
neither bleeds nor purges and yet is well fed, which 
neither toils nor spins and yet is arrayed in a magnificent 
red robe. Truly, we are dupes to pity him, and actual 
enemies of his comfort to try to get him out of here.” 

“One is comfortable here, I grant,” answered my 
uncle, “but I would quite as willingly be uncomfort- 
able somewhere else. That shall not prevent me from 
admitting, as Page has shown you, not only that the 
prison is too comfortable for the rich man, but also that 
it is too comfortable for everybody. It is undoubtedly 
hard to cry to the law when it scourges a poor fellow : 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


205 


‘ Strike harder ; you do not hurt him enough ’ ; but it 
is very necessary to guard also against that unintelli- 
gent and near-sighted philanthropy which sees nothing 
beyond his misfortune. Real philosophers, like Guil- 
lerand, like Millot-Rataut, like Parlanta, in a word, like 
all of us, should consider men only en masse^ as we con- 
sider a wheat field. A social question should always be 
examined from the standpoint of the public interest. 
You have distinguished yourself by a fine feat of arms, 
and the king decorates you with the cross of Saint 
Louis; do you think that it is because be wishes you 
well and in the interest of your individual glory that 
His Majesty authorizes you to wear his gracious image 
upon your breast ? Alas ! no, my poor brave ; it is in 
his own interest first, and then in that of the State ; it 
is in order that those who, like you, have hot blood in 
their veins, seeing you so generously rewarded, may 
imitate your example. Now, suppose that, instead of a 
good deed, you have committed a crime ; you have 
killed, not three or four men who do not wear the same 
kind of coat-collar that you do, but a good bourgeois of 
your own country. The judge has sentenced you to 
death, and the king has refused to pardon you. There 
is nothing left for you now but to draw up your gen- 
eral confession and begin your lamentation. Now, 
what feeling moved the judge to pass this sentence 
upon you ? Did he wish to rid society of you, as when 
one kills a mad dog, or to punish you, as when one 
whips an ugly child? In the first place, if his object 
had been simply to cut you off from society, a very 
deep cell .with a very thick door and a loop-hole for a 
window would have been amply sufficient for that. 


14 


206 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


Then, the judge often condemns to death a man who 
has attempted to commit suicide, and to prison a poor 
fellow to whom he knows that the prison will be hos- 
pitable. Is it, then, to punish them that he grants 
these two good-for-nothings precisely what they ask; 
that he performs for one, to whom existence is a torture, 
an operation that ends his life, and that he grants to the 
other, who has neither bread nor roof, a place of refuge ? 
The judge wishes but one thing ; he wishes to frighten 
by your torture those who would be tempted to follow 
your example. 

“ ‘ People, take care that you do not kill,’ that is all 
that your sentence means. If you could substitute for 
yourself under the knife a mannikin who resembles 
you, it would be all the same to the judge ; if even, 
after the executioner had cut off your head and shown 
it to the people, he could resuscitate you, I am very 
sure he would do so willingly ; for, after all, the judge 
is a good man, and he would not like to have his cook 
kill a chicken before his eyes. They cry very loudly, 
and you proclaim it yourselves, that it is better to acquit 
ten guilty men than to condemn one innocent man. 
That is the most deplorable of the absurdities to which 
fashionable philanthropy has given birth ; it is an anti 
social principle. I maintain, for my part, that it is 
better to condemn ten innocent men than to acquit a 
single guilty man.” 

At these words, all the guests raised a great outcry 
against my uncle. 

“ No, indeed,” cried my uncle, “ I am not joking, and 
this subject is not one to excite laughter. I express 
a firm, powerful, and long-settled conviction. The 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


207 


whole city pities the innocent man who mounts the 
scaffold ; the newspapers resound with lamentations, 
and your poets take him for the martyr of their dramas. 
But how many innocent men perish in your rivers, on 
your highways, in the depths of your mines, or even in 
your workshops, torn to pieces by the ferocious teeth of 
your machines, those gigantic animals that seize a man 
by surprise and swallow him before your eyes, you un- 
able to render him any aid. Yet their death hardly 
tears an exclamation from you. You pass by, and a 
few steps farther on you think no more about it. You 
even forget to tell your wife of it at dinner. The next 
day the newspaper buries him in one corner of its pages, 
throws over his body a few lines of heavy prose, and all 
is ended. Why this indifference for one and this super- 
abundance of pity for the other? Why ring one’s 
funeral knell with a little bell and the other’s with 
a big one ? Is a mistaken judge a more terrible acci- 
dent than an overturned stage-coach or a disarranged 
machine ? Do not my innocents make as big a hole in 
society as yours ? Do they not leave the wife a widow 
and the children orphans as well as yours ? 

“ Undoubtedly it is not agreeable to go to the scaffold 
for another, and I who speak to you admit that, if the 
thing should happen to me, I should be very much put 
out. But, in relation to society, what is this little 
blood that the executioner sheds? A drop of water 
that oozes from a reservoir, a bruised acorn that falls 
from an oak. An innocent man condemned by a judge 
is a consequence of the distribution of justice, as the 
fall of a carpenter from the top of a house is a conse- 
quence of the fact that man shelters himself under a 


208 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


roof. Out of a thousand bottles that a workman makes, 
he breaks at least one ; out of a thousand sentences that 
a judge passes, one at least will be unjust. It is an evil 
that is expected, and for which there could be no pos- 
sible remedy except the total suppression of justice. 
Take an old woman sifting beans ; what would you say 
of her if, through fear of throwing away a good one, 
she should keep all the rubbish which she found with 
it? Would it not be the same with the judge who, 
through fear of condemning one innocent man, should 
acquit ten guilty? 

“ Moreover, the condemnation of an innocent man is 
a rare thing ; it marks an epoch in the annals of justice. 
It is almost impossible that a fortuitous concourse of 
circumstances should so unite against a man as to over- 
whelm him with charges which he cannot disprove. 
And even in such a case I maintain that there is in the 
attitude of an accused man, in his look, in his gesture, 
in the sound of his voice, elements of evidence which 
cannot escape the judge. Besides, the death of an in- 
nocent man is only an individual misfortune, while the 
acquittal of a guilty man is a public calamity. Crime 
listens at the doors of your court-room ; it knows what 
goes on inside, it calculates the chances of safety which 
your indulgence leaves it. It applauds you when, 
through exaggerated caution, it sees you acquit a guilty 
man, for it is crime itself that you acquit. Justice um 
doubtedly should not be too severe ; but, when it is 
too indulgent, it abdicates, it annuls itself. From that 
time forward men predestined to crime abandon them- 
selves without fear to their instincts, and no longer see 
in their dreams the sinister face of the executioner ; be- 


ISIY TJNCLE BENJAMIlSr. 


209 


tween them and their victims the scaffold no longer 
rises ; they take your money provided' they need it, and 
your life provided it stands in their way. You applaud 
yourselves, good people, at having saved an innocent 
man from the axe, but you have caused twenty to die 
by the dagger. There is a balance of nineteen murders 
to be charged to your account. 

“And now I come back to the prison. The prison, 
in order to inspire a healthy terror, must be a place of 
torture and misery. Nevertheless, there are in France 
fifteen millions of men who are more miserable in their 
houses than the prisoner behind his bars. ‘ Too happy 
the man of the fields if he knows his happiness,’ says 
the poet. That’s all very well in an idyl. The man of 
the fields is the thistle of the mountain ; not a glowing 
ray of sunlight that does not burn him, not a breath of 
the north wind that does not bite him, not a shower 
that he must not undergo ; he toils from the morning 
Angelus till the evening Angelus ; he has an old father, 
and he cannot mitigate the severity of his old age ; he 
has a beautiful wife, and he can give her nothing but 
rags ; he has famishing children continually calling for 
bread, and often there is not a crumb in the bin. The 
prisoner, on the contrary, is warmly clad and sufficiently 
fed ; before having a piece of bread to put in his mouth, 
he is not obliged to earn it. He laughs, he sings, he 
plays, he sleeps on his straw as long as he likes, and 
yet he is the object of public pity. Charitable persons 
organize themselves into societies to make his prison 
less uncomfortable, and they do this so well that, in- 
stead of a penalty, his imprisonment becomes a reward. 
Beautiful ladies make his kettle simmer, and season 
his soup ; they preach morality to him with white bread 


210 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


and meat. Surely to the toilsome liberty of the fields 
or the shop, this man will prefer the careless and com- 
fortable captivity of the prison. The prison ought to 
he the hell of the city ; I should like to see it rise in 
the middle of the public square, gloomy and clad in 
black like the judge ; through its little grated windows 
it should cast sinister looks at the passers-by ; from 
within it should arise, instead of songs, the noise of 
clanking chains or barking dogs ; the old man should 
fear to rest under its walls ; the child should not dare 
to play Avithin its shadow ; the belated bourgeois should 
turn out of his road to avoid it, and separate himself 
from it as he separates himself from the graveyard. 
Only on this condition will you obtain from the prison 
the result that you expect of it.” 

My uncle perhaps would be discussing still, if M. 
Minxit had not arrived to cut short his argument. 
The worthy man was streaming with* perspiration ; 
he sucked in the air like a porpoise stranded on the 
beach, and was as red as my uncle’s coat. 

“ Benjamin,” he cried, mopping his forehead, “ I have 
come to take you to breakfast with me.” 

“How so. Monsieur Minxit?” cried all the guests 
together. 

“ Why, because Benjamin is free ; that is the whole 
of the mystery. Here,” he added, pulling a paper 
from his pocket and handing it to Boutron, “ this is 
Bonteint’s receipt.” 

“ Bravo, Monsieur Minxit ! ” 

And everybody, rising, glass in hand, drank to M. 
Minxit’s health. Machecourt tried to rise, but he fell 
back on his chair ; joy had almost deprived him of his 
senses; Benjamin chanced to cast a glance at him. 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


211 


“ What, Machecourt ! ” he exclaimed, “ are you 
mad? Drink to Minxit’s health, or I bleed you on 
the spot.” 

Machecourt rose mechanically, emptied his glass at 
one swallow, and began to weep. 

“ My good Monsieur Minxit,” continued Benjamin, 
“ may I ” . . . 

“ Pshaw ! ” said the latter, “ I see how it is : you are 
about to thank me ; well, I relieve you of that duty, 
my poor fellow ; it is for my owm fine eyes and not for 
yours that I take 3^ou out of here i you know very well 
that I cannot get along without you. You see, gentle- 
men, in all the actions that seem the most generous 
there is only egoism. If this maxim is not consoling, 
it is not my fault, but it is true.” 

“ Monsieur Boutron,” said Benjamin, “is Bonteint’s 
receipt in regular form ? ” 

“ I see nothing defective about it except a big blot 
which the honest tailor has doubtless added by way of 
a flourish.” 

“In that case, gentlemen,” said Benjamin, “permit 
me to go to my dear sister to announce this good news 
to her myself.” 

“I follow you,” said Machecourt, “I wish to be a 
witness of her joy ; never have I been so happy since 
the day when Gaspard came into the world.” 

“You will permit me,” said M. Minxit, sitting 
down to table. “ Monsieur Boutron, another plate. 
For that matter, gentlemen, I will do as much for you ; 
this evening I invite you to supper at Corvol.” 

This proposition was welcomed with acclamation by 
all the guests. After breakfast they retired to the cafS 
to await the hour for starting. 


CHAPTEE XVIL 

A TRIP TO CORVOL. 

The waiter came to tell my uncle that there was an 
old woman at the door who wanted to speak to him. 

“ Tell her to come in,” said Benjamin, ‘‘and give her 
some refreshment.” 

“ Yes,” answered the waiter, “ but you see the old 
woman is not at all inviting. She is ragged, and she is 
weeping tears as big as my little finger.” 

“ She is weeping ! ” cried my uncle ; “ and why, you 
scamp, didn’t you tell me that at once ? ” 

And he hastened out. 

The old woman who had called for my uncle was 
indeed shedding big tears, which she wiped away with 
an old piece of red calico. 

“ What is the matter, my good woman ? ” said Benja- 
min, in a tone of politeness that he did not assume 
toward everyone, “ and what can I do for you ? ” 

“ You must come to Sembert,” said the old woman, 
“ to see my sick son.” 

“ Sembert ! That village at the top of Monts-le-Duc ? 
Why, that’s half way to heaven ! All the same, I will 
call there to-morrow afternoon.” 

“If you do not come to-day,” said the old woman, 
“ to-morrow the priest will come with his black cross, 
and perhaps it is already too late, for my son is afflicted 
with a carbuncle.” 

“ That is awkward for your son and for me ; but, to 
212 


]VIY UI^CLE BENJAMI]?r. 


218 


accommodate everybody, could you not apply to my 
confrere Arnout?” 

“I have applied to him; but, as he is acquainted 
with our poverty and knows that he will not be paid 
for his visits, he would not disturb himself.” 

“What!” said my uncle, “you have no money with 
which to pay your doctor ? In that case, it is another 
matter ; that concerns me. I ask you to allow me only 
time enough to empty a little glass that I have left on 
the table, and I am with you. By the way, we shall 
need some Peruvian bark ; so here is a little coin ; go 
to Perier’s and buy a few ounces ; you will tell him 
that I did not have time to write a prescription.” 

A. quarter of an hour later my uncle was toiling, side 
by side with the old woman, up those uncultivated and 
savage slopes that take their roots in the faubourg of 
Bethldem and terminate in the broad plateau on top of 
which the hamlet of Sembert is perched. 

M. Minxit’s guests, for their part, started off in a cart 
drawn by four horses. The inhabitants of the faubourg 
of Beuvron had placed themselves in their doorways, 
candle in hand, to see them pass, and it was indeed a 
more curious phenomenon than an eclipse. Arthus was 
singing Amsitot que la lumiere^' ; Guillerand, Mal- 
hrough s'en va-t-en guerre ” ; and the poet Millot, whom 
they had fastened to one of the cart-stakes because he 
did not seem very solid, struck up his “ Grand Noel'^ 
M. Minxit prided himself on an extraordinary magnifi- 
cence ; he gave his guests a memorable supper, which 
is to this day a topic of conversation at Corvol. Un- 
fortunately he was so prodigal with his toasts that, 
when they reached the second course, his guests were 


214 


MY tJKCLE BENJAMIK. 


unable to raise their glasses. At this point Benjamin 
arrived. He was worn with fatigue and in a humor to 
massacre everything, for his patient had died on his 
hands, and he had fallen down twice on the road. But 
in him no sorrows or vexations could stand before a 
white table-cloth adorned with bottles ; so he sat down 
to table as if nothing had happened. 

“Your friends,” said M. Minxit, “are novices; I 
should have expected more solidity from sheriff’s offi- 
cers, manufacturers, and school-teachers ; I shall not 
have the satisfaction of offering them any champagne. 
And here is Machecourt who doesn’t know you, and 
Guillerand is offering Arthus his snuff-box instead of 
his glass.” 

“ What do you expect ? ” answered Benjamin ; 
“ everybody is not of your strength. Monsieur Minxit.” 

“Yes,” replied the worthy man, flattered by the 
compliment, “but what are we going to do with all 
these milksops? I have no beds for them all, and 
they are not in a condition to go back to Clamecy to- 
night.” 

Indeed, you are greatly embarrassed,” said my 
uncle ; “ have some straw spread in your barn, and as 
fast as they go to sleep, you can send them out on a 
litter; you can cover them, lest they may catch cold, 
with the big matting that you put over your bed of 
little radishes to keep the frost from them.” 

“ You are right,” said M. Minxit. 

He sent for two musicians commanded by the ser- 
geant, and the plan proposed by my uncle was carried 
out to the letter. Millot was not slow in going to 
sleep, and the sergeant swung him over his shoulder 


MY TJKCL-E BEISTJAMII?. 


215 


and carried him off as if he were a clock-case. The 
transportation of Eapin, Parlanta, and the others pre- 
sented no serious difficulties ; but, when they came to 
Arthus, they found him so heavy that they had to let 
him sleep where he lay. As for my uncle, he emptied 
his last bumper of champagne, and then started in his 
turn for the barn to bid them good-night. 

The next morning, when M. Minxit’s guests rose, 
they resembled sugar-loaves just taken from their cases, 
and it required all the domestics of the establishment 
to rid them of the straw with which they were cov- 
ered. After having breakfasted off the second course 
which they had left intact the night before, they 
started off with their four horses on a brisk trot. 

They would have reached Clamecy very happily, but 
for a little incident that happened on the way; the 
horses, made impetuous by the whip, overturned the 
cart into one of the thousand gullies with which the 
road was lined, and they all fell pell-mell into the mud. 
The poet Millot, who was always unlucky, had the mis- 
fortune to find himself under Arthus. 

Benjamin, fortunately for his coat, had remained at 
Corvol. M. Minxit entertained at dinner that day all 
the celebrities of the neighborhood, and among others 
two noblemen. One of these illustrious guests was M. 
de Pont-Cass^, a red musketeer ; the other was a mus- 
keteer of the same color, a friend of M. de Pont-Cass^, 
and whom the latter had invited to spend a few weeks 
with him in the remains of his castle. Now, M. de Pont- 
Cass^, into whose confidence we have already taken 
our readers, would not have been displeased to repair 
the damages which his own fortune had suffered with 


216 MY UKCLE BEITJAMIN. 

that of M. Minxit, and he had his eye on Arabelle, 
although he often told his friends that she was an in- 
sect born in urine. Arabelle had allowed herself to be 
taken in by the extravagance of his fine manners ; she 
thought him much handsomer with his faded plumes and 
much more amiable with his court rubbish than my 
uncle with his unpretentious wit and his red coat. 
But M, Minxit, who was a man not only of wit, but of 
common sense, was not at all of this opinion ; though 
M. de Pont-Cass4 had been a colonel, he would not 
have given him his daughter. He had kept Benjamin 
to dinner in order that Arabelle might institute a com- 
parison between her two adorers which, in his opinion, 
could not be to the musketeer’s advantage, and also 
because he relied on my uncle to efface the tinsel of 
the two noblemen and mortify their pride. 

Benjamin, while waiting for dinner, went to take a 
walk in the village. As he left M. MinxiPs grounds, 
he saw a pair of officers coming down the street, who 
would not have turned out for a mail-coach, and at 
whom the peasants were staring in wonder. My uncle 
was not a man to disturb himself about so small a 
matter; nevertheless, as he passed by them, he very 
distinctly heard one of them say to his companion : 
“ Say, that is the queer chap wlio wants to marry Mile. 
Minxit.” My uncle’s first impulse was to ask them 
why they thought him so queer; but he reflected that 
it would be scarcely becoming, although he generally 
cared very little for the proprieties, to make a spectacle 
of himself before the inhabitants of Corvol. So he 
acted as if he had heard nothing, and entered the house 
of his friend the tabellion. 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


217 


“ I have just met in the street,” said he, “ two fellows 
who looked like plumed lobsters, and who almost in- 
sulted me ; could you tell me to what family of the 
Crustacea these queer fellows belong ? ” 

“ Oh, the devil ! ” said the tabellion, seemingly fright- 
ened, “don’t try any of your jokes in that direction: 
one of them, M. de Pont-Cass^, is the most dangerous 
duellist of our epoch, and of all those who have gone 
on the duelling-ground with him not one has come back 
safe and sound.” 

“We shall see,” said my uncle. 

The village clock having struck two, he took his 
friend the tabellion by the arm, and went back with 
him to M. Minxit’s. The company was already gath- 
ered in the parlor, and only waiting for them in order 
to sit down at table. 

The two noblemen, who acted in the presence of 
these countrymen as if they were in a conquered 
country, monopolized the conversation from the start. 
M. de Pont-Casse did not cease twirling his moustache, 
and talking of the court, of his duels, and of his 
amorous exploits. Arabelle, who had never heard such 
magnificent things, took great pleasure in his remarks. 
My uncle noticed this ; but, as Mile. Minxit was indif- 
ferent to him, he thought it none of his concern. M. de 
Pont-Cassd, piqued at the little effect which he pro- 
duced upon Benjamin, addressed him some remarks 
that bordered on insolence ; but my uncle, sure of his 
strength, disdained to pay any attention to them, and 
occupied himself solely with his glass and his plate. 
M. Minxit was scandalized at the careless voracity of 
his champion. 


218 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ Don’t you understand what M. de Pont-Cass4 
means?” cried the good man; “of what are you think- 
ing, Benjamin ? ” 

“Of dinner, Monsieur Minxit, and I advise you to do 
the same ; for I believe that is the purpose for which 
you asked us here.” 

M. de Pont-Cass(^ had too much pride to believe that 
he could be spared. He took my uncle’s silence for a 
confession of his inferioriry, and began a more direct 
attack. 

“ I have heard you called de Rathery,” said he to 
Benjamin ; “ I was acquainted, or rather I have seen, 
for one does not make the acquaintance of such people, 
a Rathery among the king’s hostlers ; perhaps he was a 
relative of yours ? ” 

My uncle pricked up his ears like a horse struck with 
a whip. 

“M. de Pont-Cass^,’' he answered, “the Rather3"s 
never made themselves servants of the court under an}^ 
livery whatsoever. The Ratherys have proud* souls, 
Monsieur ; they will not eat bread unless they earn it, 
and they, with a few millions of\ others, pay the wages 
of those flunkeys of all colors known as courtiers.” 

There was a solemn silence among the company, and 
each one gave my uncle an approving look. 

“ Monsieur Minxit,” he added, “ a bit more of that 
hare-pie, if you please ; it is excellent, and I would 
wager that the hare of which it was made was not a 
nobleman.” 

“Monsieur,” said the friend of M. de Pont-Cassd, 
assuming a martial attitude, “ what do you mean by 
your remark about a hare? ” 


]\rY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


219 


“Tliat a nobleman,” answered my uncle coldly, 
would not be good in a pie ; that was all that I 
meant.” 

“ Gentlemen,” said M. Minxit, “it is understood of 
course that your discussions should not overstep the 
limits of pleasantry.” 

“ Understood,” said M. de Pont-Gass^; “strictly the 
remarks of M. de Rathery are of a nature to offend two 
officers of the king, who have not the honor to be, like 
himself, of the plebeians ; nevertheless, from his red 
coat and his big sword, I at first took him for one of 
ours, and I still tremble, like the man who has been on 
the point of taking a serpent for an eel, as I think that 
I came near fraternizing with him. Nothing but his 
long cue wriggling over his shoulders undeceived me.” 

“ Monsieur de Pont-Cass4,” cried M. Minxit, “ I will 
not allow ”... 

“ Let him go on, my good Monsieur Minxit,” said my 
uncle ; “ insolence is the weapon of those who do not 
know how to handle the flexible switch of wit. For 
my part, I have no occasion to reproach myself regard- 
ing my conduct toward M. de Pont-Cassd, for I have 
not as yet paid any attention to him.” 

“Very well,” said M. Minxit. 

The musketeer, who prided himself on being a very 
witty fellow and who knew that in. the combats of wit 
as well as in those of the sword fortune is fickle, did 
not become discouraged. 

“ Monsieur Rathery,” lie continued, “ Monsieur sur- 
geon Rathery, do you know that between our two pro- 
fessions there is a closer analogy than you think? I 
would bet my burnt sorrel horse against your red coat 


220 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


that you have killed more people this year than I did 
ill my last campaign.” 

“ You would win, Monsieur de Pont-Cass^,” replied 
my uncle coldly, “ for this year I have had the mis- 
fortune to lose a patient ; he died yesterday of a car- 
buncle.” 

“ Bravo, Benjamin ! Bravo, the people ! ” cried M. 
Minxit, unable longer to contain his joy. ‘‘ You see, my 
Aobleman, that all the people of wit are not at court.” 

-- You yourself are the best proof of that. Monsieur 
Minxit,” answered the musketeer, disguising the mor- 
tification of his defeat under a serene front. 

Meantime, all the guests, except the two noblemen, 
presented their glasses to Benjamin, and touched them 
cordially against his own. 

“To the health of Benjamin Rathery, the avenger of 
the misunderstood and insulted people ! ” cried M* 
Minxit. 

The dmiLCT was prolonged far into the evening. My 
uncle noticed that Mademoiselle Minxit had disap- 
peared some time after M. de Pont .Cass<^ ; but he was 
too much preoccupied with the\jjraises showered upon 
him to pay any attention to his fiancee. Toward ten 
o’clock he took leave of M. Minxit. The latter es- 
corted him to the limits of the village, and made him 
promise that the marriage should take place within a 
week. As Benjamin arrived at a point opposite the 
Trucy mill, a sound of conversation reached his ears, 
and he thought he distinguished the voice of Arabelle 
and that of her illustrious adorer. 

Benjamin, out of regard for Mile. Minxit, did not 
wish to surprise her at that hour on a country road 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


221 


with a musketeer. He hid beneath the branches of a 
large walnut-tree, and waited for the two lovers to pass 
before continuing on his way. He doubtless did not 
intend at all to steal Arabelle’s little secrets, but the 
wind brought them to him, and, in spite of himself, he 
had to receive the confidence. 

“ I know a way,” said M. de Pont-Cass^, “ of making 
him pack off : I will send him a challenge.” 

“ I know him,” answered Arabelle ; “ he is a man of 
ungovernable pride, and, though he Avere sure of being 
killed on the spot, he would accept.” . 

“ So much the better ! In that way I shall rid you 
of him forever.” 

“ Yes, but in the first place I do not want to be an 
accomplice in a murder ; and in the second place my 
father loves this man more perhaps than he loves me, 
his only daughter ; I will never consent that you shall 
kill my father’s best friend.” 

“You are charming, Arabelle, with your scruples; 
I have killed more than one for a word that rang badly 
in my ear, and this plebeian, whose Avit is ferocious, has 
taken a cruel revenge upon me ; I should not like 
everybody at court to know what was said to-night at 
your father’s table. Nevertheless, not to go counter to 
your Avishes, I will content myself Avith crippling him. 
If, for instance, I should cut the cord of his kneepan, 
that would be a disqualification sufficient to justify you 
in refusing him your hand.” 

“But suppose you. Hector, should fall yourself?” 
said Mile. Minxit in her tenderest voice. 

“ I Avho have killed the finest SAVordsmen of the 
army,— the brave Bellerive, the terrible Desrivitos, 

15 


222 


]VIY UNCLE BENJAJMIN. 


the formidable Chateaufort, — I fall by a surgeon’s 
rapier ! But you insult me, my beautiful Arabelle, 
when you give voice to such a doubt. Do you not 
know, then, that I am as sure of my sword as you of 
your needle? Designate yourself the spot where, you 
would like me to strike him, and I shall be delighted to 
serve you with this bit of gallantry.” 

The voices were lost in the distance; my uncle left 
his hiding-place, and tranquilly resumed his journey to 
Ciamecy, considering what course he should take. 


CHAPTER XVni. 


WHAT MY UNCLE SAID TO HIMSELF REGARDING DUELING. 

“ M. DE Pont-Casse wishes to cripple me ; he has 
promised Mile. Minxit that he will do so, and a knight 
of the musketeers is not a man to fail in his word. 

‘‘ Let me see : what shall I do in this matter ? Must 
I allow myself to be crippled by M. de Pont-Cassd with 
the docility of a dog under the scalpel, or shall I decline 
the honor that he condescends to do me? It is for 
M. de Pont-Cass^’s interest that I should go upon 
crutches ; that I knoAV ; but I do not exactly see why 
I should give him that pleasure. I hold very little to 
Mile. Minxit, although she is decorated with a dowry 
of one hundred thousand francs ; but I hold very much 
to the symmetry of my person, and I flatter myself that 
I am sufficiently good-looking to keep this pretension 
from seeming ridiculous. You say, a man challenged 
to a duel must fight; but where do you find that, if 
you please? Is it in the Pandects, in Charlemagne’s 
Capitularies, in the commandments of God, or in those 
of the Church? And in the first place, M. de Pont- 
Cassd, between you and me is the match really equal ? 
You are a musketeer and I am a doctor; you are an 
artist in the matter of fencing, and I scarcely know how 
to handle anything but the bistoury or the lancet ; you, 
it seems, feel no more scruple in depriving a man of his 
limb than in tearing a wing from a fly, whereas I have 
a horror of blood, and especially of arterial blood. 

223 


224 


IVIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


Would it not be as ridiculous on my part to accept 
your challenge as if I were to consent to walk a tight 
rope upon the challenge of a rope-walker, or to cross an 
arm of the sea upon the defiance of a professor of swim- 
ming? And even though the chances were equal be- 
tween us, when one concludes a treaty he must hope to 
gain something thereby ; now, if I kill you, what shall 
I gain ? And if I am killed by you, then what shall I 
gain? You see, in either case I should make a dupe’s 
bargain. You repeat that every man challenged to a 
duel must fight. What ! if a murderer of the highway 
should stop me at the corner of a wood, I should feel 
no scruple in escaping from him with the aid of my 
good legs, but, when a murderer of the drawing-room 
places a challenge under my nose, I must feel myself 
obliged to throw myself upon the point of his sword ? 

“According to you, when an individual whom you 
know only from accidentally having stepped on his toe, 
writes to you : ‘ Monsieur, be present at such an hour, 
at such a spot, in order that I may have the satisfaction 
of killing you, in reparation of the insult which you 
have offered me,’ one must submit to the orders of this 
person, and furthermore take good care not to keep 
him waiting. Strange thing ! there are men who would 
not risk a thousand francs to save their friend’s honor 
or their father’s life, and who risk their own life in a 
duel on account of an equivocal word or a squinting 
glance. But then, what is life ? It is, then, no longer 
a blessing without which all others are of little conse- 
quence ? It is, then, a rag to be thrown to the passing 
rag-picker, or a piece of worn-out money to be aban- 
doned to the first blind man that sings beneath your 


My uncle benjamin. 


225 


window? They require that I shall stake iny life 
against that of M. de Pont-Cass^ in a game of SAVords, 
whereas, if I should play a game of cards for a hundred 
francs, I should be a man ruined in reputation, and the 
poorest cobbler among them all would not have me for 
a son-in-law. According to them, I should be more 
prodigal of my life than of my money. And must I, 
who pride myself on being a philosopher, regulate my 
conduct by the opinions of such casuists ? 

“In fact, what is this public which assumes to judge 
our actions? Grocers who sell with false weights, 
clothiers who give false measure, tailors who dress 
their brats at the expense of their customers, men of 
property who live on usury, mothers of families Avho 
have lovers, and, in short, a heap of crickets and grass- 
hoppers who know not what they sing, ninnies who 
say yes and no without knowing why, an areopagus of 
imbeciles incapable of giving reasons for their conclu- 
sions. I should be in pretty business, I, a doctor, if I 
should decide, because these boobies believe that Saint 
Hubert cures of the rabies, to send a patient suffering 
with hydrophobia to Ardennes to kneel at the shrine of 
that great saint. Choose those among them who pride 
themselves on being sages, and you will see how con- 
sistent they are with themselves. Their philosophers 
utter loud cries when one speaks to them of those poor 
women of Malabar who throw themselves, alive and 
decked in all their finery, on the funeral-pile of their 
husband; and when two men cut each other’s throats 
for a straw, they aAvard them a crown for intrepidity. 

“ You say that I am a coward when I have the good 
sense to decline a challenge ; but what is cowardice* 


226 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


then, in your opinion ? If cowardice consists in recoil- 
ing from useless danger, where will you find a coura- 
geous man? Who of you, when his roof is cracking 
and flaming above his head, remains calmly dreaming in 
his bed ? Who, when he is seriously sick, does not call 
the doctor to his'aid? Who, finally, when he falls into a 
river, does not clutch at the bushes on the banks ? Once 
more, what is this public ? A coward that preaches 
temerity. Suppose that M. de Pont-Casse were to chal- 
lenge, not me, Benjamin Kathery, but the j)ublic to 
fight a duel, how many out of the whole crowd would 
dare to accept this defiance ? 

“ And besides, has a philosopher any other public to 
consider than the men who think and reason? Now, in 
the eyes of such people is not the duel the most absurd 
as well as the most barbarous of prejudices ? What 
is proved by the logic that is learned in an armory ? 
A well-delivered sword thrust is a magnificent argu- 
ment, is it not? Parry tierce, parry quarte, you can 
now demonstrate anything you like. It is a great pity, 
indeed, that, when the pope excommunicated as hereti- 
cal the revolution of the earth around the suii, Galileo 
did not think of summoning His Holiness to a duel to 
prove that this revolution was a fact. 

“ In the Middle Ages the duel had at least a reason ; 
it was the consequence of a religious idea. Our grand- 
parents thought God too just to allow an innocent man 
to fall under the blows of a guilty man, and the issue of 
the combat was regarded as a decree from on high. 
But with us, who are, thank Heaven, well recovered 
from those mad ideas, and who believe in the temporal 
justice of God only to such extent as we like, how can 
the duel be justified and of what use is it? 


MY UNCLE BENJAlVnN. 


227 

“You fear that they will accuse you of lacking in 
courage if you decline a challenge ; but those wretches 
who make murder a profession and defy you because 
they feel sure of killing you, what, then, do you think 
of their courage ? What do you think of the courage 
of the butcher who kills a sheep with its feet bound, or 
that of the huntsman who fires pitilessly at a hare in 
its form or at a bird singing on its branch. I have 
known several of these people who had not pluck 
enough to have a tooth pulled ; and among the number 
how many are there who would dare to obey their con- 
science against the will of the man upon whom they 
are dependent? I can understand that the cannibals 
dwelling in the islands of the new world should kill 
men of their own color in order to roast them, and, 
after they have been well cooked, to eat them ; but 
with what sauce will you, a duelist, eat the body of 
the man you challenge, after you have killed him? 
You are more guilty than the assassin whom justice 
condemns to die upon the scaffold; he at least was 
i)ushed to murder by poverty, — a praiseworthy senti- 
ment perhaps in its origin, however deplorable in its 
results. But what is it that puts the sword in your 
hand? Is it vanity, or an appetite for blood, or curi- 
osity to see how a man writhes in the convulsions of 
the death-agony? Do you picture to yourself a wife 
throwing herself, half-crazed with grief, across the 
body of her husband, children filling the widowed 
house, draped with black, with their lamentations, a 
mother praying God to receive her in the place of 
her son in his coffin? And it is you who, moved by 
a tiger’s self-love, have caused all these miseries ! You 


228 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


wish to kill US if we do not give you the title of a man 
of honor ! But you are not worthy of the name of 
man : you are only a brute thirsting for blood, only a 
viper that bites for the pleasure of killing without 
profiting by the evil that it does ; and even the viper 
respects itself in its fellows. When your adversary 
has fallen, you kneel in the mud mixed with his blood, 
you try to stanch the wounds you have made, you aid 
him as if you were his best friend ; but then, why did 
you kill him, wretch ? A great deal society cares for 
your remorse ! Will your tears replace the blood that 
you have shed? You, fashionable assassin, you, re- 
spectable murderer, you find men to take your hand, 
mothers of families to invite you to their parties ; 
those women who faint at the sight of the executioner 
dare to press their lips against yours, and suffer you to 
rest your head upon their bosom. But these men and 
women judge things only by their names : they are 
horrified at the murder that is called assassination, and 
they applaud the murder that is called a duel. And 
after all, how much time have you in which to enjoy 
this applause which they shower upon you? On high, 
beside your name is written homicide. You have on 
your brow a stain of clotted blood which the kisses 
of your mistresses will not wipe out. You have found 
no judge on earth, but in heaven a judge awaits you who 
will not be taken in by your tall talk about honor. As 
for me, I am a doctor, not to kill, but to cure, do you 
hear, M. de Pont-Cassd ? If you have too much blood 
in your veins, only with the point of my lancet can I 
let it out for you.” 

Thus reasoned my uncle to himself. We shall soon 
see how he put his doctrine in practice. 


]VrY UNCLE BENJAmN, 


229 


Night does not always bring good counsel. My uncle 
rose the next day, determined not to cower before the 
provocation of M. de Pont-Cassd, and, in order to end 
the adventure as soon as possible, he started that very 
day for Corvol. Whether he had not breakfasted, or 
did not perspire freely, or suffered from an unfinished 
digestion of the day before, he felt an unusual melan- 
choly creeping over him in spite of himself. In a very 
pensive mood, like Kacine’s Hippolyte, he followed the 
successive slopes of the mountain of Beaumont; his 
noble sword, which generally fell with rigorous per- 
pendicularity along his thigh-bone and threatened the 
earth with its point, affecting now the trivial attitude 
of a hroclie^ seemed to conform to his sad thought ; and 
his three-cornered hat, which usually stood proud and 
straight upon his head with a slight inclination toward 
the left ear, now sat sheepishly upon his neck, and 
seemed itself preoccupied with sinister ideas ; his stony 
eye had softened. He contemplated with a sort of emo- 
tion the valley of Beuvron which stretched away stiff 
and shivering at his feet; those large walnut trees in 
mourning, which, with their dark branches, resembled 
a vast polyp ; those long poplars that had but a few red 
leaves left on them, and on the tops of which thick 
clusters of ravens sometimes balanced themselves ; that 
wild copse browned by the frost; the dark river that 
flowed between its banks of snow toward the mill- 
wheels; the dungeon of La Postaillerie, gloomy and 
vaporous like a column of clouds ; the old feudal castle 
of Pressure, crouching among the brown reeds of its 
moats and seeming to have a fever; and the village 
chimneys throwing out together their light thin smoke, 


230 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


like the breath of a man who blows between his lingers. 
The tic-tac of the mill, that friend with which he had 
conversed so often on his way back from Corvol in the 
line moonlight nights of autnran, was. full of sinister 
notes ; it seemed to say in its spasmodic language ; 

Porteur de rapiere, 

Tu vas au cimetiere. 

To which my uncle replied : 

Tic-tac indiscret, 

Je vais oil il me plait; 

Si c’est au trepas, 

Ca n’te r’garde pas. 

The weather was gloomy and sickly: huge white 
clouds, pushed by the north wind, dragged heavily 
across the sky, like a wounded swan ; the snow, de- 
prived of its glitter by a grayish day, was dull and dim, 
and the horizon was closed in every direction by a girdle 
of fogs that dragged along the mountains. It seemed 
to my uncle that he would never again see, lighted by 
the joyous sun of spring and adorned with its festoons 
of verdure, this landscape over which winter now had 
spread so thick a veil of sadness. 

M. Minxit was absent when my uncle arrived at 
Corvol; he entered the drawing-room. M. de Ppnt- 
Cass4 was installed upon a sofa, by the side of Arabelle. 
Benjamin, without paying any attention to the pout of 
his JiancSe and the provoking airs of the musketeer, 
threw himself into an arm-chair, crossed his legs, and 
laid his hat on a chair, like a man in no hurry to go. 
When they had talked for some time about M. Minxit’s 
health, the probabilities of a thaw, and the grippe, Ara- 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


281 


belle became silent, and my uncle could get nothing 
more out of her beyond a few sharp and shrill mono- 
syllables, like the notes which an apprentice musician 
elicits with great difficulty and at rare intervals from 
his clarinette. M. de Pont-Cass(^ walked up and down 
the drawing-room, twirling his moustache and sounding 
his big spurs on the floor ; he seemed to be studying to 
himself the best way of picking a quarrel with my 
uncle. 

Benjamin had divined his intentions, but he had the 
air of paying no attention to him, and took up a book 
that was lying on a sofa. At first he contented himself 
with turning over the leaves, watching M. de Pont- 
Casse out of the corner of his eye ; but, as it was a 
medical work, he soon became absorbed in its interesting 
contents and forgot the musketeer. The latter decided 
to bring things to a crisis i he halted before my uncle, 
and, surveying him from head to foot, said to him : 

“Do you know. Monsieur, that your visits here are - 
very long ? ” 

“ It seems to me,” answered my uncle, “ that you 
were here when I came.” 

“ And also very frequent,” added the musketeer. 

“ I assure you, Monsieur,” replied my uncle, “ that 
they would be much less frequent if I expected alwa}^ 
to find you here.” 

“ If you come here on Mile. Minxit’s account,” con- 
tinued the musketeer, “ she begs you by my lips to rid 
her of your long person.” 

“ If Mile. Minxit, who is not a musketeer, had any 
orders to give me, she would give them more politely : 
at any rate. Monsieur, you will allow me to wait before 


232 


m" UNCLE BENJAmN. 


retiring until she has explained herself on this subject 
and until I have interviewed M. Minxit.” 

And my uncle went on with his chapter.. 

The officer went up and down the drawing-room a 
few times more, and then, again placing himself oppo- 
site my uncle, he said to him : 

‘‘I pray you, Monsieur, to interrupt your reading for 
a moment, as I have a word to say to you.” 

“Since it is but a word,” said my uncle, turning 
down the leaf that he was reading, “ I can easily waste 
a moment in listening to you.” 

M. de Pont-Cass.4 was exasperated at Benjamin’s 
sang-froid. 

“ I declare to you. Monsieur Rathery,” said he, “ that, 
if you do not go out on the instant through the door, I 
will throw you through the window.” 

“Really ! ” said my uncle. “ Well, I, Monsieur, will 
be more polite than you; I shall throw you through 
the door.” 

And taking the officer by the middle of the body, he 
carried him to the head of the steps and locked the door 
behind him. 

As Mile. Minxit was trembling, my uncle said to 
her : 

• “ Do not be too much afraid of me ; the act of vio- 
lence which I have permitted myself toward this man 
was superabundantly justified by a long series of in- 
sults. And besides,” he added, bitterly, “I shall not 
embarrass you long with my long person ; I am not 
one of those dowry-marryers who take a w'oman from the 
arm of the man she loves and fasten her brutally to the 
foot of their bed. Every young girl has received from 


MY UKCLE BENJAMIN. 


283 


heaven her treasure of love : it is just that she should 
choose the man with whom it pleases her to share it ; 
no one has the right to pour the white pearls of her 
youth into the street and trample them under foot. 
God forbid that a base greed for money should lead me 
to commit a bad action I So far I have lived poor ; I 
know the joys of poverty, and I am ignorant of the 
miseries of wealth ; in exchanging my mad and laugh- 
ing indigence for a cross and snarling opulence, per- 
haps I should make a bad bargain ; at any rate, I 
should not like this opulence to come to me with a 
woman who detested me. I beg you, then, to tell me, 
in all the sincerity of your soul, whether you love M. 
de Pont-Cass^ ; I need your reply in order to determine 
my conduct toward you and your father.” 

Mile. Minxit, affected by Benjamin’s frankness, an- 
swered : 

“ If I had known you before M. de Pont-Casse, per- 
haps you would now be the object of my love.” 

“Mademoiselle,” interrupted my uncle, “it is not 
politeness, but sincerit}^ that I ask of you; tell me 
frankly whether you think that you would be happier 
with M. de Pont-Casse than with me.” 

“What shall I say. Monsieur Rathery?” answered 
Arabelle ; “ a woman is not always happy with the man 
she loves, but she is always unhappy with the man she 
does not love.” 

“I thank you. Mademoiselle; now I know what I 
have to do. Will you kindly order some breakfast for 
me ? The stomach is an egoist which has little sym- 
pathy with the tribulations of the heart.” 

My uncle breakfasted as Alexander or Csesar prob- 


234 


]SrY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


ably breakfasted on the eve of battle. He did not want 
to await M. Minxit’s return ; he did not feel the courage 
to face his grieved expression when he should learn 
that he, Benjamin, whom he treated almost as a son, 
had abandoned the design of becoming his son-in-law. 
He preferred to inform him by letter of his heroic de- 
termination. 

At some distance from the town he saw the friend of 
M. de Pont-Cassd walking majestically up and down 
the road. The musketeer advanced to meet him, and 
said to him ; 

“ Monsieur, you keep those who have a reparation to 
ask of you waiting a very long time.” 

“ I was eating breakfast,” answered my uncle. 

“ I have to hand you, in behalf of M. de Pont-Cassd, 
a letter to which he has charged me to bring back a 
reply.” 

“ Let us see, then, what this estimable nobleman has 
to say to me : ‘ Monsieur, in view of the enormity of 
the outrage which you have inflicted upon me ’ . . . — 
What outrage ! I have carried him from a drawing-room 
to the steps ; I wish some one would thus outrage me by 
carrying me to Clamecy. . . . — ‘ I consent to cross swords 
with you.’ — The grand soul!... What! he conde- 
scends to grant me the favor of being crippled by him ! 
If that is not generosity, then I am mistaken ! — ‘I hope 
that you will show yourself worthy of the honor which 
I do you, by accepting it.’ — Why, of course ! it would 
be base ingratitude on my part to refuse. You may say 
to your friend that, if he kills me like the brave Desri- 
vidres, the intrepid Bellerive, etc., etc., I wish them to 
write upon my tombstone in golden letters ; ‘ Hei*e 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


235 


lies Benjamin Ratbery, killed in a duel by a nobleman.’ 
— ‘Postscript.’ — What! your friend’s note has a post- 
script ? — ‘I will await you to-morrow at ten o’clock in 
the morning at the place known as Chaume-des-Ferti- 
aux.’ — At the place known as Chaume-des-Fertiaux I 
Upon my honor, a process-server could not have drawn 
it up better. But Chaume-des-Fertiaux is a good league 
from Clamecy ; I, Avho have no burnt sorrel horse, have 
not time to go so far to fight. If your friend will con- 
descend to go to the place known as Croix-des-Miche- 
lins, I shall have the honor to await him there.” 

“ And where is this Croix-des-Michelins ? ” 

“ On the Corvol road, at the height of the faubourg 
of Beuvron. Your friend must be very pessimistic if 
he does not like that spot ; from there one may enjoy a 
panorama worthy of a king ; before him he will see the 
hills of Sembert with their terraces loaded with vines, 
and their big bald craniums with the forest of Frace on 
their necks. At another season of the year the view 
would be still finer, but I cannot revive the springtime 
with a breath. At their feet the town, with its thou- 
sand wavy plumes of smoke, presses between its two 
rivers and climbs the arid slopes of Crot-Pin§on like 
a man pursued. If your friend has any talent for draw- 
ing, he will be able to enrich his album from this point 
of view. BeUveen its great gables, which, covered with 
dark moss, resemble pieces of crimson velvet, rises the 
tower of Saint Martin, invested with its turrets and 
decorated with its jewels of stone. This tower in itself 
alone is worth a cathedral ; by its side extends the old 
basilica, which throws to the right and to the left, with 
admirable boldness, its great arch-shaped counter-forts. 


236 


MY TOCLE BEi^JAMIK. 


Your friend cannot help comparing it to a gigantic 
spider resting on its long claws. Toward the south 
run, like a succession of sombre clouds, the bluish 
mountains of Morvan ; then ”... 

“ Oh, enough of banter, if you please ! I did not 
come here for you to show me the magic lantern. To- 
morrow then, at Croix-des-Michelins.” 

“ To-morrow ? One moment, the affair is not so 
pressing that it cannot be postponed. To-morrow I am 
going to Dornecy to taste a cask of old wine which 
Page proposes to buy ; he relies on my judgment as to 
quality and price, and you must see that I cannot, for 
the sake of your friend’s fine eyes, fail in the duties 
that friendship imposes on me ; day after to-morrow I 
breakfast in town ; I cannot, in decency, give the 
preference to a duel over a breakfast; Thursday I am 
to tap a patient of mine, who has the dropsy ; as your 
friend wishes to cripple me, it would be impossible for 
me to perform the operation afterward, and Doctor 
Arnout would not do it well ; for Friday . . . yes, that’s 
a fast day; I believe I have no engagement for that 
day, and I see nothing to prevent me from playing your 
friend.’s game.” 

“ W e are obliged to comply with your desires ; at 
least, you will do me the favor to bring a second with 
you, in order to save me from playing the tiresome 
rdle of spectator.” 

“Why not? I know that you are a pair of friends, 
you and M. de Pont-Cass^ : I should be sorry to sepa- 
rate you. I will bring my barber, if he has time, and if 
that suits you.” 

lusolent fellow I ” gc^id the musketeer, 


MY UNCLE BENJAIMIN. 


237 


“ This barber,” answered -my uncle, ‘‘ is n@t a man to 
be despised : he has a rapier long enough to spit four 
musketeers upon, and moreover, if you prefer me to 
him, I will willingly take his place.” 

“ I take note of your words,” said the musketeer. 

]My uncle, as soon as he had risen, went in search of 
Machecourt’s inkstand. He began to compose in his 
finest style and his clearest penmanship a magnificent 
epistle to M. Minxit, in which he explained to him why 
he could not become his son-in-law. My grandfather, 
who was given an opportunity of reading it, has told' 
me that it would make a jailer weep. If the exclama- 
tion point had not then existed, my uncle certainly 
would have invented it. The letter had been in the 
post-office scarcely a quarter of an hour, when M. 
Minxit in person arrived at my grandmother’s, accom. 
panied by the sergeant, who was himself accompanied 
by two masks, two foils, and his respectable poodle. 

Benjamin was just then breakfasting with Mache- 
court off a herring and the patrimonial white wine of 
Choulot. 

“Welcome, Mohsieur Minxit!” cried Benjamin; 
“ wouldn’t you like a bit of this fish ? ” - 

“ Fie I do you take me for a thrasher ? ” 

“ And you, sergeant ? ” 

“ I have given up this sort of thing since I had the 
honor to join the band.” 

“But your dog, what would he think of this head?” 

“ I thank you for him, but I believe he has little taste 
for sea-fish.” 

“It is true that a herring is not as good as a pike 
cooked in court-bouillon ”... 


238 


TNIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ And how about a carp stewed in Burgundy wine ? ” 
interrupted M. Minxit. 

“To be sure, to be sure,” said Benjamin; “you 
might even say a jugged hare prepared by your own 
hand ; but at any rate herring is excellent when you 
haven’t anything else. By the way, I mailed a letter 
to you a quarter of an hour ago; you probably have 
not received it yet. Monsieur Minxit? 

“No,” said M. ^linxit, “but I come to bring you the 
answer. You pretend that Arabelle does not love you, 
and because of that you will not marry her.” 

“ M. Rathery is right,” said the sergeant. “ I had a 
bed-fellow who did not like me, and whose dislike I 
cordially returned ; our household was a regular police- 
station. When one wanted turnips in the soup, the 
other put in carrots; at the canteen, if I asked for 
currant wine, Le sent for gin. We quarrelled to see 
which should have the best place for his gun. If he 
had a kick to give, he bestowed it on my poodle, and 
when he was bitten by a flea, he would have -it that it 
came from this poor Azor. Would you believe it, we 
once fought in the moonlight because he wanted to 
sleep on the right side of the bed, and I insisted that 
he should take the left. To get rid of him I was 
obliged to send him to the hospital:” 

“You did quite right, sergeant,” said my uncle: 
“ when people do not know how to live in this world, 
we sentence them to the other forever.” 

“There is some truth in what the sergeant says,” 
said M. Minxit. “ To be loved is more than to be rich, 
for it is to be happy ; consequently, I do not disapprove 
your scruples, my dear Benjamin. All that I ask of 


MY UNCLE BENJA.MIN. 


239 


you is that you continue, as in the past, to come to 
Corvol. , That you do not wish to be my son-in-law is 
not a reason why you sliould cease to be my friend. 
You will no longer be obliged to play the languishing 
lover to Arabelle, to go after water to sprinkle her 
flowers, or to go into ecstasies over the ruffles which 
she embroiders for me and over the superiority of her 
cream-cheeses. We will breakfast, we will dine, we 
will philosophize, w^e will laugh, that is as good a 
pastime as any other. You are fond of truffles, 1 will 
perfume my whole pantry with them ; you have a predi- 
lection for volnay ^ — a predilection which I do not 
share, — but I shall always have some in my wine-cellar; 
if you take a notion to hunt, I will buy ypu a double- 
barrelled gun and a pair of hounds. I give Arabelle 
less than three months to get sick of her nobleman and 
to love you madly. Do you accept or not? Answer 
me, yes or no. You are aware that I am not fond of 
fine phrases.” 

“ Well, yes. Monsieur Minxit,” said my uncle. 

“ Very well, I expected nothing less from your friend- 
ship. And now you are going to fight a duel ? ” 

“ Who the devil told you that ? ” cried my uncle. 
“I know that urines hide nothing from you; can you 
have consulted my urine without my knowledge?” 

‘‘You are to fight with M. de Pont-Cass^, you rogue; 
you are to . meet him three days hence at Croix-des- 
Michelins, and, in case you rid yoursfelf of M. de Pont- 
Cass^, the other musketeer will take his place : you see 
that I am well informed.” 

“ What, Benjamin ! ” cried Machecourt, turning paler 
than his plate. 


240 


]VIY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


“What, wretch!” added my grandmother, “you are 
to fight a duel ? ” 

“ Listen to me. you, Machecourt, you, my dear sister, 
and you too. Monsieur Minxit : it is true that I am to 
fight with M. de Pont-Casse. My mind is made up ; so 
save yourself the representations which would weary me 
without causing me to abandon my design.” 

“I do not come,” answered M. Minxit, “to place 
obstacles in the way of your duel ; I come, on the con- 
trary, to furnish you a means of coniing out of it vic- 
toriously, and furthermore of making your name famous 
throughout the country. The sergeant knows a superb 
thrust, with which he could disarm in an hour the en- 
tire corporation of fencing-masters. As soon as he has 
drunk a glass of. white wine, he shall give you your first 
lesson ; I leave him with you until Friday, and shall 
remain here myself to watch you, lest you may waste 
your time in the taverns.” 

“ But," said my uncle, “ I have only to make your 
thrust, and moreover, if your thrust is infallible, what 
glory should I win in triumphing by this means over 
our vicomte? Homer, in rendering Achilles invulner- 
able, deprived him of all the merit of his valor. I 
have reflected; my intention is not to fight with the 
sword.” 

“What! you want to fight with the pistol, imbecile! 
Now, if it were with M. Arthus, who is as big as a 
wardrobe, that would be all very well.” 

“I fight neither with the pistol nor with the sword; 
I wish to serve these bullies with a duel of my own 
making ; I reserve for you the pleasure of the surprise ; 
you shall see, Monsieur Minxit.” 


MY UXCLE BENJAMIN. 


241 


“Very well,” answered the latter, “but learn my 
thrust all the same : it is a weapon that will not em- 
barrass you, and one never knows what one may need.” 

My uncle’s room was in the second story, over that 
occupied by Machecourt. So after breakfast, he shut 
himself up in his room with the sergeant and M. Minxit 
to begin his fencing-lessons. But the lesson was not of 
long duration: at Benjamin’s first appeal Machecourt’s 
worm-eaten floor gave way under his feet, and he went 
through up to his arm-pits. 

The sergeant, amazed at the sudden disappearance of 
his pupil, remained standing with his left arm gently 
curved on a level with his ear and his right arm extended 
in the attitude of a man who is about to make a thrust. 
As for M. Minxit, he was seized with such a desire to 
laugh that he came near suffocating. 

“Where is Bathery?” he cried. “What has become 
of Rathery ? Sergeant, what have you done with 
Rathery?” 

“ I see M- Rathery ’s head well enough,” answered the 
sergeant, “ but devil take me if I know where his legs 
are.” 

Gaspard just then was alone in his father’s room ; at 
first he was a little astonished at the abrupt arrival of 
his uncle’s legs, which certainly he did not expect, but 
soon his surprise changed into mad shouts of laughter, 
which mingled with those of M. Minxit. 

“ Hello, there, Gaspard,” cried Benjamin, who heard 
him. 

“ Hello, there, my dear uncle,” answered Gaspard. 

“ Place your father’s leather arm-chair under my feet, 
I beg of you, Gaspard.” 


242 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“1 have not the right,” replied the scamp; “mj 
mother has forbidden anybody to stand on it.” 

“Will you bring me that arm-chair, accursed cross- 
bearer ?” 

“Take off your shoes, and I will bring it to you.” 

“ And how do you expect me to take off myvshoes ? 
My feet are in the first story, and my hands are in 
the second.” 

“Well, give me a franc to pay me for my trouble.” 

“ I will give you a franc and a half, my good Gaspard, 
but the arm-chair at once, I beg of you ; my arms Avill 
soon separate from my shoulders.’* 

“Credit is dead,” said Gaspard : “give me the franc 
and a half at once', otherwise, no arm-chair.” 

Fortunately Machecourt came in at this moment; he 
gave Gaspard a kick, and put. an end to the suspension 
of his brother-in-law. Benjamin went to finish his 
fencing-lesson at Page’s, and he proved so apt a pupil 
that in two hours’ time he was as skilful as his teacher. 


CHAPTER XTX. 

HOW MY UNOLE THEICE DISAEMED ISf. DE POi^T-CASSE. 

The dawn, a dull and grimacing dawn of February, 
had scarcely thrown its leaden tints upon the walls of 
his room, when my uncle was up. He dressed himself 
gropingly, and softly descended the stairs, being espe- 
cially desirous of not waking his sister. But, as he was 
crossing the stair-landing, he felt a woman’s hand on his 
shoulder. 

“ What, dear sister ! ” he cried, in a sort of fright, 
“you are already awake?” 

“ Say rather that I am not yet asleep, Benjamin. Be- 
fore you go, I wanted to say farewell to you, perhaps a 
last farewell, Benjamin. Do you imagine how I suffer 
when I think that you leave this house full of life, 
youth, and hope, and that perhaps you will re-enter it 
borne on the arms of your friends, and your body pierced 
with a sword? Is your mind firmly made up? Before 
coming to a decision, did you think of the grief with 
which your death would fill this sad house? For you, 
when your last drop of blood has gone, all will be over ; 
but mauy months nnd years will pass before our grief is 
exhausted, and the tpar-grass over your grave will have 
been long withered before our tears cease to flow.” 

My uncle went away without answering, and perhaps 
he was weeping ; but my grandmother caught him by 
the skirt of his coat. 

“ Run, then, to your murderous rendezvous, ferocious 

243 


244 


MY UKCLE BENJAMlit. 


beast,” she cried; “do not keep M. de Pont-Cass^ wait- 
ing. Perhaps honor requires you to start without kiss- 
ing your sister ; but at least take this relic which cousin 
Guillaumot has lent me ; perhaps it will preserve you 
from the dangers into which you are about to throAV 
yourself so heedlessly.” 

INIy uncle thrust the relic into his pocket and slipped 
away. 

He ran to awaken M. Minxit at his tavern. They 
took Page and Arthus in passing, and all went to break- 
fast together in a wine-shop at the extremity of Beuvron. 
My uncle, if he was to fall, did not wish to depart this 
life with an empty stomacli. He said that a soul which 
reaches the tribunal of God between two glasses of wine 
has more courage and pleads his cause better than a 
poor soul full of nothing but sweetened water. The 
sergeant was j)resent at the breakfast ; when they were 
at dessert, my uncle asked him to go to Croix-des-Mi- 
chelins to carry a table, a box, and two chairs, which he 
needed for his duel, and to build a big fire there with 
vine-poles from the neighboring vineyard ; then he called 
for coffee. 

M. de Pont-Cass^ and his friend were not slow in 
arriving. 

The sergeant did the honors of the bivouac to the 
best of his ability. 

“Gentlemen,” said he, “be good enough to sit down 
and warm yourselves. M. Rathery begs you to excuse 
him if he keeps you waiting a little, but he is at break- 
fast with his seconds, and in a few minutes he will be 
at your disposition.” 

Benjamin arrived, in fact, a quarter of an hour later 


MY UKCLE BENJAMI^^. 


245 


holding Arthus and M. Minxit by the arm, and singing 
with bare throat : 

“ Ma foi, c’est un triste soldat 
Que celui qui ne sait pas boire ! ” 

My uncle saluted his two adversaries graciously. 

“ Monsieur,” said M. de Pont-Cassd, haughtily, “ we 
have been waiting for you twenty minutes.” 

“ The sergeant must have explained to you the cause 
of our delay, and I hope that you will find it legiti- 
mate.” 

“Your excuse is that you are a plebeian, and this is 
probably the first time that you have had a duel with a 
nobleman.” 

“What do you expect? We plebeians are accus- 
tomed to take coffee after each of our meals, and be- 
cause you call yourself Vicomte de Pont-Cassd, that is 
no reason why we should violate this custom. Coffee, 
you see, is beneficent, it is a tonic, it agreeably stimu- 
lates the brain, it gives movement to the thought. If 
you have not taken coffee this morning, the weapons 
are not equal, and I do not know whether I can con- 
scientiously measure myself against you.” 

“ Laugh, Monsieur, laugh while you can ; but I warn 
you that he laughs best who laughs last.” 

“ Monsieur,” rejoined Benjamin, “ I do not laugh 
when I say that coffee is a tonic : that is the opinion of 
several celebrated doctors, and I myself give it as a 
stimulant in certain diseases.” 

“ Monsieur ! ” 

“ And your burnt sorrel horse ? I am greatly aston- 
ished not to see him here ; is it possible that he is indis- 
posed?” 


246 


MY UNCLE benjamin. 


“ Monsieur,” said the second musketeer, “ enough of 
your wit ; 'you undoubtedly have not forgotten why you 
have come here ? ” 

“ Oh, ho ! it is you, number two ? Delighted to 
renew my acquaintance with you; indeed I have not 
forgotten why I come liere, and the proof,” he added, 
pointing to the table on which the box was placed, “ is 
that I have made preparations to receive you.” 

“ And what need have we of this juggler’s apparatus 
in order to fight with the sword ? ” 

“ But,” said my uncle, “ I do not fight with the sword.” 

“ Monsieur,” said M. de Pont-Cass6, “ I am the in- 
sulted party ; I have the choice of weapons ; I choose 
the sword.” 

“ It is I, Monsieur, who was first insulted ; I will not 
yield my privilege ; and I choose chess.” 

At the same time he opened the box which the ser- 
geant had brought, and, having taken oqt a chess-board, 
he invited the nobleman to take his place at the table. 

M. de Pont-Cass^ turned pale with anger. 

“ Are you trying to make sport of me ? ’’ he cried. 

“Not at all,” said my uncle; “every duel is a game 
in which two men stake their lives : why should not 
this game be played as well with chess as with the 
sword? However, if you doubt your strength at chess, 
I am ready to play you a game of Scarte or of triomphe. 
In five points, if you like, without a return game or a 
rubber ; in that way it will be soon over.” 

“I have come here,” said M. de Pont-Cass^, scarcely 
able to contain himself, “ not to stake my life like a 
bottle of beer, but to defend it with my sword.” 

“ I understand,” said my uncle ; “ you are of superior 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


247 


skill with the sword, and 3^011 hope to have an advan- 
tage over me, who never hold mine except to put it at 
my side. Is that a nobleman’s fairness ? If a mower 
should propose to fight you with the scythe, or a 
thrasher with a flail, would you accept, I ask you?” 

“You will fight with the sword,” cried M. de Pont- 
Cass^, beside himself ; “ otherwise,” he added, lifting 
his riding-whip . . . 

“Otherwise what?” said my uncle. 

“ Otherwise I will cut you across the face with my 
riding-whip.” 

“ You know how I answer your threats,” retorted 
Benjamin. “No, Monsieur, this duel shall not be 
accomplished as you hope. If you persist in your un- 
fair obstinacy, I shall believe and declare that you have 
speculated on your bravo’s skill, that you have set a 
trap for me, that' you have come here, not to risk your 
life against mine, but to cripple me, do you understand, 
M. de Pont-Cass4? And I shall hold you for a coward, 
yes, for a coward, my nobleman, for a coward, yes, for a 
coward.” 

And my uncle’s words vibrated between his lips like 
a rattling window-pane. 

The nobleman could endure it no longer ; he drew 
his sword and rushed upon Benjamin. It would have 
been all up with the latter, if the poodle, by throwing 
himself upon M. de Ponf-Casse, had not changed the 
direction df his sword. The sergeant having called off 
his dog, my uncle cried : 

“ Gentlemen, I call you to witness that, if I accept 
the combat, it is to save this man from committing a 
murder.” 


248 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


And, flashing his sword in the air in turn, he sustained 
the impetuous attack of his adversary without retiring 
a step. The sergeant, seeing no sign of his thrust, 
stamped on the grass like a war-horse tied to a tree, 
and twisted his wrist till he nearly threw it out of joint, 
to indicate to Benjamin the motion that he ought to 
make in order to disarm his man. M. de Pont-Casse, 
exasperated at the unexpected resistance which he met, 
had lost his sang-froid and with it his murderous skill. 
He no longer tried to parry the thrusts which his adver- 
sary might make at him, hut sought only to pierce him 
with his sword. 

“Monsieur de Pont-Cassd,” said my uncle, “you 
would have done better to play chess : you never parry ; 
I could kill you at any moment.” 

“ Kill, Monsieur,” said the musketeer ; “ that is what 
you are here for.” 

“ I prefer to disarm you,” said my uncle, and, quickly 
passing his sword under that of his adversary, he sent it 
into Hie middle of the hedge. 

“Well done! bravo!” cried the sergeant; “I could 
not have sent it so far myself. If you could only take 
lessons of me for six months, you would be the best 
swordsman in France.” 

M. de Pont-Cass^ desired to begin the combat again. 
The seconds, however, were opposed to this. But my 
uncle said : 

“No, gentlemen, the first time does not count, and 
there is no game without a return game. The repara- 
tion to which Monsieur is entitled must be complete.” 

The two adversaries put themselves on guard again ; 
but at the first thrust M. de Pont-Cass4’s sword went 


MY UNCLE BENJAIVIIN. 


249 


flying into the road. As he ran to pick it up, Benjamin 
said to him, in his sardonic voice : 

“ I ask your pardon. Monsieur Comte, for the trouble 
that I give you ; hut it is your own fault : if you had 
been willing to play chess, you Avould not have had to 
disturb yourself so often.” 

A third time the musketeer returned to the charge. 

“Enough!” cried the seconds; “you abuse M. Ra- 
thery’s generosity.” 

“ Not at all,” said my uncle ; “ Monsieur undoubtedly 
wishes to learn the thrust: permit me to give him 
another lesson.” 

In fact, the lesson was not long in coming, and M. 
de Pont-Cass^’s sword escaped from his hand for the 
third time. 

“At least,” said my uncle, “you would have done 
well to bring a servant with you to run after your 
sword.” 

“ You are the demon in person,” said the vicomte ; “ I 
would rather have been killed by you than treated so 
ignominiously.” 

“ And you, my nobleman,” said Benjamin, turning to 
the other musketeer, “you see that my barber is not 
here. Do you wish me to fulfil the promise that I 
made to you?” 

“By no mean^” said the musketeer; “to you the 
honors of the day: there is no cowardice in retiring 
before you, since you do not lift your sword against the 
conquered. Although you are not a nobleman, I hold 
you as the best swordsman and the most honorable man 
that I know ; for' your adversary wanted to kill you, 
but you, who had his life in your hands, respected it. 


250 


:my uncle benjamin. 


If I were king, you should be at least a duke and 
peer. And now, if you attach any value to my friend- 
ship, I offer it to you with all my heart, and ask yours 
in exchange.” 

He extended his hand to my uncle, who grasped it 
cordially in his own. M. de Pont-Casse stood before 
the fire, gloomy and sullen, his brow charged with a 
stormy cloud. He took his friend’s arm, saluted my 
uncle freezingly, and went away. 

My uncle hastened to return to his sister ; but the 
report of his victory had spread rapidly through the 
faubourg. At every step he was intercepted by a self- 
styled friend who came to congratulate him on his fine 
feat of arms and to shake his arm clear to the shoulder 
under pretext of grasping his hand. The urchins, that 
population which each fresh event gathers in the street? 
swarmed about him and deafened him with their hur- 
rahs. In a few moments he became the centre of a 
horribly tumultuous crowd, who tagged at his heels, 
spattered his silk stockings, and tumbled his three- 
cornered hat into the mud. He was still able to ex- 
change a few words with M. Minxit, but, under pretext 
of completing his triumph, Cicero, the drummer whom 
you already know, placed himself at the head of tlie 
crowd with his drum, and began to beat the charge 
vigorousl}^ enough to shatter the bridge of Beuvron ; 
Pjenjamin even had to give him thirty sous for his din. 
The only thing lacking to complete his misfortune was 
an harangue. That is how my uncle was rewarded for 
having risked his life in a duel. 

“ If, on the height of Croix-des-Michelins,” he said to 
himself, I had given a few louis to a wretch dying 


T^IY UNCLE BENJAMIN. ' 251 

of luiiiger, all tliese loungers now shouting about me 
would let me pass quietly enough. i\Iy God! what, 
then, is glory, and to whom does it appeal ? Tliis noise 
that they make around a name, is it a blessing so rare 
and so precious that, to obtain it, one should sacrifice 
rest, happiness, sweet affection, the finest years of one’s 
life, and sometimes the peace of the world ? The lifted 
finger that points you out to the public, upon wliom, 
then, has it not been fixed? The child whom they take 
to church to the sound of pealing bells, the ox that they 
lead through the city, decorated witli flowers and ril)- 
bons, the six-footed calf, the stuffed boa-constrictor, the 
monster pumpkin, the acrobat who walks a wire, the 
aeronaut who makes an ascension, the juggler who swal- 
lows balls, the prince who passes, the bishop who 
blesses, the general who returns from a far-off victory, — 
have not all these had their moment of glory? You 
think yourself celebrated, you who have sown your 
ideas in the arid furrows of a book, who have made men 
out of marble and passions out of ivory-black and white- 
lead; but you would be much more famous if you had 
a nose six inches long. As for tliat glory which sur- 
vives us, it does not belong to everybody, I admit; but 
the difficulty is to enjoy it. Find me a banker who dis- 
counts immortality, and from tounorrow I will toil to 
make myself immortal.” 

My uncle wanted to have a family dinner at his sis- 
ter’s with M. Minxit; but the worthy man, although 
his dear Benjamin stood before him, safe, sound, and 
victorious, was sad and preoccupied. What my uncle 
had said in the morning to M. de Pont-Cass(^ came back 
continually to his mind. He said that a voice rang in 


252 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


his ears summoning him to Corvol. He was seized 
Avith a nervous agitation like that felt by persons who 
have drunk a strong cup of coffee when not accustomed 
to it. He Avas frequently obliged to leave the table 
and take a turn about the room. ' This undue excite- 
ment frightened Benjamin, and he himself urged him 
to depart. 


CHAPTER XX. 


ABDUCTION AND DEATH OF MLLE. MINXIT. 

My uncle, however, escorted M. Minxit as far as 
Croix-des-Miclielins, and then returned to go to bed. 
He was in that profound annihilation produced by the 
first hours of sleep when he was awakened by a violent 
knock at the outside door. This knock gave my uncle 
a painful shock. He opened his window; the street 
was as dark as a deep ditch; nevertheless he recog- 
nized M. Minxit, and thought he perceived in his at- 
titude indications of distress. He ran to open the 
door; scarcely had he drawn the bolt, when the 
worthy man threw himself into his arms and burst into 
tears. 

‘‘Well, what is it. Monsieur Minxit? Come, speak 
out ; tears do not end in anything ; certainly no mis- 
fortune has happened to you ? ” 

“ Gone ! gone ! ” cried M. Minxit, choking with 
sobs, “gone with him, Benjamin!” 

“ What ! Arabelle has gone with M. de Pont-Cass^ ? ” 
said my uncle, divining at once what he meant. 

“ You were quite right to warn me to distrust him ; 
why did you not kill him? ” 

“ There is still time,” said Benjamin ; “ but first we 
must start in pursuit.” 

“ And you will accompany me, Benjamin ; for in you 
lies all my strength, all my courage.” 

“ Accompany you ! Of course I will ; and directly. 

17 253 


254 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


And, by the way, did it occur to you to supply yourself 
with money ? ” 

“ I haven’t a bit of cash, my friend ; the poor girl 
carried off all the money that there was in my sec- 
retary.” 

‘‘ So much .the better,” said my uncle ; ‘‘ you can at 
least be sure that she will want for nothing until we 
catch her.” 

“ As soon as it is light, I will go to my banker to get 
some funds.” 

“Yes,” said my uncle, “do you think that they will 
amuse themselves in making love on the greensward by 
the roadside ? When it is light, they will be far from 
here. You must go at once to awaken your banker, 
and knock at his door until he has counted out a thou- 
sand francs for you. You will have to pay twenty per 
cent, instead of fifteen, that is all.” 

“But what road have they taken? We must wait 
for daylight in order to make inquiries.” 

“Not at all,” said my uncle ; “they have taken the 
Paris road : M. de Pont-Cass^ can go only to Paris ; I 
have it on good authority that his leave of absence ex- 
pires in a few days. I am going at once to get a carriage 
and two good horses ; you will join me at the Golden 
Lion.” 

As my uncle, started to go out, M. Minxit said to 
him ; ' 

“ But you have nothing on but your shirt.” 

“ True, you are right,” said Benjamin, “ I had for- 
gotten that ; it was so dark that I did not notice 
it; but in five minutes I shall be dressed, and in 
twenty minutes I shall be at the Golden Lion ; I will 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


255 


say good-bye to my dear sister when I return from our 
journey.” 

An hour later my uncle and j\I. jNIinxit, in a rickety 
vehicle drawn by two jades, were driving along the ex- 
ecrable cross-road that then led from Clamecy to Au- 
xerre. By daylight winter is tolerable, but at night it 
is horrible. With the utmost diligence they could em- 
ploy, it was ten o’clock in the morning when they 
arrived at Courson. Under the porch of La Levrette, 
the only tavern in the neighborhood, a coffin was ex- 
posed, and a whole swarm of old women, hideous and 
in rags, were croaking around it. 

“I have it from Gobi, the sexton,” said one, “that 
the young lady lias promised to give three thousand 
francs to be distributed among the poor of the parish.” 

“We shall get some of that. Mother Simonne.” 

“ If the young lady dies, as they say she will, the 
proprietor of La Levrette will take everything,” an- 
swered a third ; “ we should do well to go and see the 
bailiff, that he may look after our inheritance.” 

My uncle called one of these old women, and asked 
her to explain to him what this meant. The latter, 
proud at having been singled out by a stranger who 
had a two-horse carriage, gave her companions a look 
of triumph, and said : , 

“ You have done well to ask me, my good Monsieur, 
for I know all the details of this matter better than they 
do. He who is now in this , coffin was this morning in 
that green carriage that you see yonder in the coach- 
house. He was a grand lord, worth millions, who was 
going with a young lady to Paris, to court perhaps, and 
he stopped here, and he will remain in that poor ceme- 


256 


MY UlSrCLE BENJAMIN. 


tery to rot with the peasants whom he so despised. He 
was young and handsome, and I, old Manette, Avho am 
all worn out and good for nothing, shall go to sprinkle 
holy water on his grave, and in ten years, if I live so 
long, his rottenness will have to make room for my old 
bones. For in vain are all these grand gentlemen rich, 
sooner or later they have to go where we go ; in vain do 
they dress themselves in velvets and taffetas, their last 
coat is always made of the planks of their coffin; in 
vain do they care for and perfume their skin, the worms 
of the earth are made for them as well as for us. To 
think that I, the old w^tsherwoman, shall be able to go, 
when I like, to squat on a nobleman’s grave. Oh, my 
good Monsieur, this thought does us good ; it consoles 
us for being poor, and avenges us for not being nobles. 
For the rest, it is really his faidt that he is dead. He 
wanted to take possession of a traveller’s room because 
it was the finest in the tavern. A quarrel ensued be- 
tween them ; they went to fight in the garden of La 
Levrette, and the traveller put a ball through his head. 
The young lady, it seems, Avas Avith child, poor woman. 
When she learned that her husband Avas dead, she was 
taken in labor, and is scarcely better off just noAV than 
her noble husband. Doctor Debrit left her room just 
noAV ; as I do his Avashing, I inquired of him regarding 
the young woman, and he ansAvered : ‘ Ah ! Mother 
Manette, I Avould rather be in your old Avrinkled skin 
than in hers.’ ” 

“ And this grand lord ? ” said my uncle, “ had he not 
a red coat, a light Avig, and three plumes in his hat? ” 

“ He had all those, my good Monsieur ; perhaps you 
kneAv him ? ” 


MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


257 


“No,” said my uncle, “but I may have seen him 
somewhere.’^ 

“ And the young lady ? ” said M. Minxit, “ is she not 
tall, and has she not red spots on her face ? ” 

“ She is a good five feet three inches in height,” an- 
swered the old woman, “ and has a skin like the sliell of 
a turkey’s egg.” 

M. Minxit fainted. » 

Benjamin carried M. Minxit to his bed, and cared for 
him; then he asked to be taken to Arabelle; for the 
beautiful lady who was dying in the pains of child-birth 
was M. Minxit’s daughter. She occupied the room that 
her lover had obtained at the cost of his life. A gloomy 
room, truly, the possession of which was scarcely worthy 
quarrelling about. 

There Arabelle lay in a bed of green serge. My 
uncle opened the curtains and looked at her for some- 
time in silence. A moist and dull pallor, like that of 
a white marble statue, had spread over her face ; her 
half-open eyes were faded and expressionless ; her 
breath escaped in sobs. Benjamin lifted her arm that 
lay motionless along the bed; having felt her pulse, 
he sadly shook his head, and ordered the nurse to go 
for Dr. D^brit. Arabelle, on hearing his voice, trem- 
bled like a corpse under the influence of a galvanic 
current. 

“ Where am I ? ” said she, throwing a wild look about 
her; “have I, then, been the plaything of a sinister 
dream? Is it you. Monsieur Rathery, whom I hear, 
and am I still at Corvol in my father’s house?” 

“ You are not in your father’s house,” said my uncle ; 
“ but your father is here. He is ready to forgive you ; 


258 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


lie asks of you but one thing, — that you will allow 
yourself to live that he may live also.” 

Arabelle’s eyes chanced to fix themselves upon M. de 
Pont-Casse’s uniform, which was hanging on the wall, 
still soaked in blood. She tried to sit up in bed, but 
her limbs twisted in a horrible convplsion, and she fell 
back heavily, as a corpse falls back that has been raised 
in its coffin. Benjamin placed his hand upon her heart ; 
it was no longer beating. He held a mirror at her lips ; 
the glass remained clear and brilliant. Misery and hap- 
piness, all were over for the poor Arabelle. Benjamin 
stood erect at her bedside, holding her hand in his, and 
plunged in an abyss of bitter reflections. 

Just then a heavy and uncertain step was heard on 
the stairs. Benjamin hastened to turn the key in the 
lock. It was M. Minxit, who knocked at the door, and 
cried : 

“It is I, Benjamin ; open the door ; I wish to see my 
daughter ; I must see her I She cannot die until I have 
seen her.” 

It is a cruel thing to suppose a dead person to be 
alive, and to attribute acts to her as, if she were still in 
existence. My uncle, however, did not shrink from 
this necessity. 

“ Go away. Monsieur Minxit, I beg of you. Arabelle 
is better ; she is resting : your sudden presence might 
provoke a crisis that would kill her.” 

“ I tell you, wretch, that I wish to see my daughter,” 
cried M. Minxit; and he made such a violent effort 
against the door that the staple of the lock fell on the 
floor. 

“Well,” said Benjamin, hoping still to deceive him. 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


259 


“ you see your daughter is quietly sleeping. Are you 
satisfied now, and will you go away ? ” 

The unhappy old man threw a glance at his daugh- 
ter. 

“ You are lying,” he cried, in a voice that made Ben- 
jamin tremble ; “ she is not asleep, she is dead ! ” 

He threw himself upon her body and pressed her 
convulsively to his breast. 

“ Arabelle ! ” he cried, “ Arabelle ! Arabelle ! Oh ! 
was it thus, then, that I was to find you again? She, 
my daughter, my only child ! God leaves the brow of 
the murderer to cover itself with white hairs, and he 
takes from a father, his only child. How can they tell 
us that God is good and just?” Then, his grief 
changing into anger against my uncle, he continued: 
“ It is you, miserable Rathery, who caused me to refuse 
her to M. de Pont-Cass^; but for you she wpuld be 
married and full of life.” 

“ Are you joking? ” said my uncle. “ Is it my fault 
if she has become smitten with a musketeer ? ” 

All passions are nothing but blood rushing to the 
brain. M. Minxit’s reason had doubtless given way 
under this terrible grief ; but in the paroxysm of his de- 
lirium his scarcely-closed vein (it will be remembered 
that my uncle had just bled him) reopened. Benjamin 
allowed the blood to flow, and soon a salutary swoon 
succeeded this superabundance of life, and saved the 
poor old man. Benjamin gave orders and money to the 
proprietor of La Levrette, in order that Arabelle and 
her lover might receive an honorable burial. Then he 
came back to station himself at M. Minxit’s bedside, 
and watched over him like a mother over her sick child. 


260 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


M. Minxit remained three days between life and the 
grave ; but, thanks to the skilful and affectionate care 
of my uncle, the fever which was devouring him grad- 
ually disappeared, and soon he was in a condition to be 
carried to Corvol. 


CHAPTER XXL 


A FINAL FESTIVAL. 

Moxsieur Mixxit liad one of those antediluvian 
constitutions that seem made of more solid material 
than our own. It was one of those deep-rooted plants 
that still preserve a vigorous vegetation when winter 
has withered the others. Wrinkles had been unable 
to ruffle this granite brow; years had accumulated 
upon his head without leaving any trace of decline. 
He had remained young till past his sixtieth year, and 
his winter, like that of the tropics, was still full of sap 
and flowers ; but time and misfortune forget nobody. 

The death of his daughter, coming after her flight 
and after the revelation of her pregnancy, had dealt 
this powerful organization a mortal blow ; a slow fever 
was silently undermining him. He had renounced 
those noisy inclinations that had made his life one long 
festivity. He had put aside medicine as a useless em- 
barrassment. The companions of his long youth re- 
spected his sorrow, and, without ceasing to love him, 
they had ceased to see him. His house was silent and 
sealed, like a tomb; and scarcely could its occupants 
get a few stealthy glimpses of the village through the 
blinds occasionally half-opened. The yard no longer 
rang with the noise of people going and coming ; the 
early weeds of the spring had taken possession of the 
avenue, and high domestic plants grew along the walls, 
forming a circle of verdure. 

261 


262 


MY UXCLE BENJAMIN. 


This poor soul in mourning neeclecl nothing now but , 
obscurity and silence. He had done as the wild beast 
that retires, when it wishes to die, into the gloomiest 
depths of its forest. My uncle’s gayety had proved 
powerless to overcome this incurable melancholy. 
M. Minxit answered his joyousness only by a sad and 
gloomy smile, as much as to say that he had under- 
stood and thanked him for his good intentions. 

My uncle had counted on the spring to bring him back 
to life. But the spring, wdiich dresses the dry earth anew 
in flowers and verdure, cannot revive a grief-stricken 
soul, and, while all else was being born again, the poor 
man was slowly dying. 

It was an evening in the month of May. He was 
walking in his field, resting on Benjamin’s arm. The 
sky was clear, the earth was green and fragrant, the 
nightingales were singing in tlie po^^lars, tlie dragon- 
flies were hovering among the reeds of the brook with 
a harmonious rustling of their wings, and the water, all 
covered with hawthorn blossoms, was murmuring under 
the roots of tlie willows. 

‘‘This is a fine evening,” said Benjamin, trying to 
rouse M. Minxit from the gloomy reverie which en- 
wrapped his mind like a shroud. 

“Yes,” answered the latter, “a fine evening for a 
jioor peasant who goes between two flowering hedges, 
with his pick on his shoulder, toward his smoking hut, 
where his children aAvait liiin; but, for the father in 
mourning for his daughter, there are no more fine 
evenings,” 

“ And at what fireside,” said my uncle, “ is there not 
some vacant chair ? Who has not in the field of rest 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


26 B 


some grassy hillock, where every year, on All Saints’ 
day, he comes to shed pious tears ? And in the streets 
of the city what throng, however pink and gilded, is 
not stained with black? When sons grow old, they 
are condemned to put their old parents in the grave ; 
when they die in their prime, they leave a desolate 
mother on her knees beside their coffin. Believe me, 
man’s eyes were made much less for seeing than for 
weeping, and every soul has its wound, as every flower 
has its insect nibbling at it. But also, in the path of 
life, God has put forgetfulness, which follows death 
with slow steps, effacing the epitaphs which death has 
traced and repairing the ruins which death has made. 
Are you willing, my dear Monsieur Minxit, to follow a 
piece of good advice ? Believe me then, go eat carp 
on the shores' of Lake Geneva, macaroni at Naples, 
drink X^res wine at Cadiz, and taste ices at Constan- 
tinople ; in a year you will come back as fat and round 
as you used to be.” 

M. Minxit allowed my uncle to harangue as long as 
he liked, and, when he had finished, he said to him : 

“ How many days have I still to live, Benjamin ? ” 

“ Why? ” said my uncle, amazed at the question and 
thinking he had misunderstood him ; ‘‘ what do you 
mean, Monsieur Minxit ? ” 

“ I ask you,” repeated M. Minxit, “ how many days I 
have still to live.” 

“The devil!” said my uncle, “ that is a very em- 
barrassing question : on the one hand, I should not like 
to disoblige you ; but, on the other, I know not whether 
prudence permits me to satisfy your desire. They an- 
nounce to the condemned man the news of his execu- 


264 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


tioii only a few hours before his journey to the scaffold, 
and you” . . . 

“It is a service,” interrupted M. Minxit, “which I 
impose upon your friendship, because you alone can 
render it. The traveller must know at what hour he is 
to start, in order that he may pack his forU-manteaiir 

“Do you wish me, then, to speak frankly and sincerely. 
Monsieur Minxit? Will you, on your honor, not be 
frightened at the sentence that I shall utter?” 

“ I give you my word of honor,” said M. Minxit. 

“Well, then,” said my uncle, “I will speak as if it 
Avere myself.” 

He examined the old man’s dried-up face ; he inter- 
rogated his dim, dull eye, which still reflected but a few 
gleams of light ; he consulted his 2:)ulse, as if listening 
to its beating with his fingers ; and for some time Avas 
silent ; then he said : 

“ To-day is Thursday ; well, on Monday there Avill 
be one house more in mourning in Corvol.” 

“A very good diagnosis,” said M. Minxit; “Avhat 
you have just said, I thought myself ; if you ever find 
an opportunity to introduce yourself, I predict that 
you will make one of our medical celebrities ; but does 
Sunday belong to me entirely? ” 

“ It belongs to you from beginning to end, provided 
you do nothing to hurry the end of your days.” 

“ I have nothing more to do,” said M. Minxit ; “ do 
me noAV the service of inviting our friends for Sunday 
to a solemn dinner ; I do not Avish to go aAvay on bad 
terms with life, and it is Avith glass in hand that I desire 
to make my fareAvell. You Avill insist on their accept- 
ance of my invitation, making it, if necessary, a duty 
on their part.” 


MY TJKCLE BEKJA]Sn]Sr. 


265 


“ I will go myself to invite them,” said my uncle, 
“ and I guarantee that none of them shall fail you.” 

“Now, let us pass to another order of ideas. Ido 
not wish to be buried in the churchyard; it lies in a 
valley, it is cold and damp, and the shadow of the 
church stretches over its surface like crape. I should 
be uncomfortable in that spot, and you know that I like 
my ease. I desire you to bury me in my field, at the 
edge of this brook of whose harmonious song I am so 
fond.” He tore up a handful of grass, and said : “ See, 
here is the spot where I wish you to dig my last resting- 
place. You will plant here a bower of vines and honey- 
suckles, in order that the verdure may be mingled with 
flowers, and you will come here sometimes to dream of 
your old friend. In order that you may come oftener, 
and also in order that they may not disturb my sleep, I 
leave you this domain and all my other property. But 
this is on two conditions : first, that you shall live in 
the house that I am about to leave empty ; and, second, 
that you shall continue to attend my patients as I have 
attended them for thirty years.” 

“I accept with gratitude this double inheritance,” 
said my uncle, “ but I warn you that I will not go to 
the fairs.” 

“ Granted,” answered M. Minxit. 

“ As for your patients,” added Benjamin, “ I will 
treat them conscientiously and according to the system 
of Tissot, which seems to me founded on experience and 
reason. The first one of them to leave this world shall 
bring you news of me.” 

“ I feel the cold of evening creeping over me ; it is 
time to say farewell to this sky, to these old trees which 


266 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


will never see me more, to these little birds that sing, 
for we shall not come back here till Monday morning.” 

Tlie next day he shut -himself up with his friend, the 
taballion. The day after that he grew weaker and 
weaker and kept his bed ; but, when Sunday came, he 
rose, had himself powdered, and put on his best coat. 
Benjamin, as he had promised, had been to Clam’ecy to 
extend the invitations ; not one of his friends had failed 
to respond to this funeral call, and at four o’clock they 
found themselves all gathered in tlie drawing-room. 

M. Minxit was not slow in making his appearance, 
tottering and resting on my uncle’s arm. He shook 
hands with all of them, and thanked them affectionately 
for having conformed to liis last desire, which was, he 
said, the caprice of a dying man. 

Tliis man whom they had seen sometime before, so 
gay, so happy, and so full of life, grief had broken ; old 
age had come upon him at one stroke. At sight of 
him, all shed tears, and Arthus himself suddenly felt 
his appetite leave him. 

A servant announced that dinner was ready. M. 
Minxit placed himself as usual at the head of the table. 

“ Gentlemen,” said he to his guests, “ this dinner is 
to me a final dinner ; I wish my last looks to be fixed 
only on full glasses and merry faces ; if you wish to 
please me, you will give free course Jbo your accustomed 
gayety.” 

He poured out a few drops of Burgundy, and ex- 
tended his glass to his guests. They all said together : 

“ To M. Minxit’s health ! ” 

“No,” said M. Minxit, “not to my health; of what 
use is a wish that cannot be gratified? But to your 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


267 


healtli, to you all, to your prosperity, to your happi- 
ness, and may God keep those of you who have chil- 
dren from losing them ! ” 

“ M. Minxit,” said Guillerand, “ has taken things 
too much to heart; I should not have thought him 
capable of dying of sorrow. I too have lost a daugh- 
ter, a daughter whom I placed at school with the Sis- 
ters. It pained me for a time, but now I am none the 
worse for it, and sometimes, I confess, the thought 
occurs to me that I have no longer to pay her board.” 

“A bottle broken in your wine-cellar,” said Arthus, 
“or a scholar taken from your school would have 
caused you more sorrow.” 

“ It well becomes you,” said Millot, “ to talk thus, 
you, Arthus, who fear no misfortune except the loss of 
appetite.” 

“I have more bowels than you, song-maker,” an- 
swered Arthus. 

“ Yes, for digestive purposes,” said the poet. 

“ Well, it is of some value to be able to digest well,” 
replied Arthus ; “ at least, when you go in a cart, 
your friends are not obliged to fasten you to the cart- 
stakes, for fear of losing you on the way.” 

“ Arthus,” said Millot, “ no personalities, I pray you.”, 

“ I know,” answered Arthus, “ that you bear me ill- 
will because I fell on you on the way from Corvol. 
But sing me your ‘ Grand-Noel,’ and we shall be quits.” 

“ And I maintain that my song is a fine bit of poesy ; 
do you wish me to show you a letter frqpi Monseigneur 
the bishop, who compliments me upon it ? ” 

“ Yes, put your song on the gridiron, and you will 
find out what it is worth,” 


268 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ I recognize you there, Arthus ; you value nothing 
that isn’t roasted or boiled.” 

“ What would you ? My sensitiveness resides in my 
palate ; and I like as well to have it there as anywhere 
else. Is a solidly-organized digestive apparatus worth 
less, for purposes of haj^piness, than a largely-developed 
brain? That is the question.” 

“ If we should leave it to a duck or a pig, I do not 
doubt that they would decide it in your favor ; but I 
take Benjamin for judge.” 

“ Your song suits me very well,” said my uncle : 

“ ‘ A genoux, chretiens, a genoux ’ : 

That is superb. What Christian could refuse to kneel 
when you invite him to do so twice in a line of eight 
syllables? But I am of the opinion of Arthus ; I prefer 
a cutlet in papers.” 

‘‘ A joke is not a reply,” said Millot. 

“Well, do you think that there is any moral sorrow 
that causes as much suffering as a tooth-ache or an ear- 
ache? If the body suffers more keenly than the soul, 
it must likewise enjoy more energetically ; that is logic ; 
pain and pleasure result from the same faculty.” 

“ The fact is,” said M. Minxit, “ that, if I had my 
choice between the stomach of M. Arthus and the over- 
oxygenated brain of J. J. Rousseau, I should take the 
stomach of M. Arthus. Sensitiveness is the faculty of 
suffering ; to be sensitive is to walk barefooted over the 
sharp 'pebbles ^f life, to pass through the crowd that 
rubs against and jostles you, with an open wound in 
your side. Man’s unhappiness consists of unsatisfied 
desires. Now, every soul that feels too keenly is a bal- 


]MY UNCLE BENJAmN. 


269 


loon that would like to mount to heaven but cannot go 
beyond the limits of the atmosphere. Give a man good 
health and a good appetite, and plunge his soul into 
perpetual somnolence, and he will be the happiest of all 
beings. To develop his intelligence is to sow thorns in 
his life. The peasant who plays at skittles is happier 
than the man of wit who reads a fine book.” 

All the guests became silent after these words. 

“ Parlanta,” said M. Minxit, “ what is the status of 
my suit against Malthus ? ” 

‘‘We have a warrant for his arrest,” said the sheriff’s 
officer. 

“Well, you will throw all the documents into the 
fire, and Benjamin will reimburse you for the costs,. 
And you, Rapin, how does my trouble with the clergy 
in relation to my music come on ? ” 

“ The case is postponed for a week,” said Rapin. 

“ Then they will sentence me by default,” answered 
M. Minxit. 

“ But,” said Rapin, “ perhaps there will be a heavy 
fine. The sexton has testified that the sergeant in- 
sulted the vicar when the latter summoned him to evac- 
uate the square in front of the church with his band.” 

“ That is not true,” said the sergeant ; “ I only 
ordered the band to play the air: ‘Where are you 
going. Monsieur Abb^?’” 

“ In that case,” said M. Minxit, “ Benjamin will flog 
the sexton at the first opportunity ; I want the scamp to 
remember me.” 

They had reached the dessert. M. Minxit made a 
punch, ^nd poured into his glass a few drops of the 
flaming liquor, 

1 ? 


270 


INIY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


“ That will hurt you, Monsieur Minxit,” said Mache- 
court. 

“And what can hurt me now, my good Machecourt? 
I must make my farewell to all that has been dear to 
me in life.” 

IMeanwhile his strength rapidly grew less, and he 
could express himself only in a weak voice. 

“You know, gentlemen,” said he, “that it is to my 
funeral that I have invited you ; I have had beds pre- 
pared for all of you, in order that you may be in readi- 
ness to-morrow morning to escort me to my last resting- 
place. I wish no one to weep over my death : instead 
of crape, you will wear roses in your coats, and, after 
wetting the leaves in a glass of champagne, you will 
strew them over my grave. It is the cure of a sick 
man, the deliverance of a captive, that you celebrate. 
And by the way,” he added, “ which of you will under- 
take my funeral oration ? ” 

“ It shall be Page,” said some. 

“No,” answered M. Minxit, “Page is a lawyer, and 
at the- grave the truth must be told. I prefer that it 
should be Benjamin.” 

“ I ! ” said my uncle ; “ you know very well that I am 
no orator.” 

“You are enough of an orator for me,” answered M. 
Minxit. “ Come, speak to me as if I were lying in my 
coffin ; I should be much pleased to hear while living 
what posterity will say of me.” 

“ Indeed,” said Benjamin, “ I really don’t know what 
to say.” 

“ What you like, but make haste, for I feel myself 
sinking.” 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


271 


“ Well,” said my uncle, “‘he whom we lay under 
this foliage leaves behind him unanimous regrets.’ ” 

“‘Unanimous regrets’ is not good,” said M. Minxit; 
“ no man leaves behind him unanimous regrets ; that 
is a lie that can be retailed only from a pulpit.” 

“ Do you prefer ‘ friends who will weep over him for 
a long time ’ ? ” 

“ That is less ambitious, but it is no more exact. For 
one friend who loves us loyally and without reserve, 
we have twenty enemies hidden in the shadow, Avho 
await in silence, like a hunter in ambush, an opportu- 
nity to injure us ; I am sure that there are in this vil- 
lage many people who will be happy at my death.” 

“Well, ‘he leaves behind him inconsolable friends,’ ” 
said my uncle. 

“‘Inconsolable’ is another falsehood,” answered 
M. Minxit. “We doctors do not kimw what part of 
our organization sorrow affects, or how it makes us suf- 
fer ; but it is a disease that is cured without treatment 
and very quickly. Most sorrows are to the heart of 
man only slight scabs that fall almost as soon as they 
are formed; none are inconsolable except fathers and 
mothers who have children in the grave.” 

“ ^ Who will long preserve yonr memory ’ ; does that 
suit you better ? ” 

“That will do,” said M. Minxit; “and that this 
memory may be more lasting, I provide a permanent 
fund for a dinner to be eaten at each anniversary of my 
death, at which you will all be present as long as you 
remain in this part of the country; Benjamin is 
charged with the execution of my will.” 

“ That is better than a service,” said my uncle ; and 


272 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


he continued in these terms : “ ‘ I will not speak to you 
of his virtues.’ ” 

Say ‘ qualities,’ ” said M. Minxit ; “ that savors less 
of exaggeration.” 

‘“Nor of his talents: you have all been in a position 
to appreciate them.’ ” 

“ Especially Arthus, from whom I have won during 
the past year forty-five bottles of beer at billiards.” 

“ ‘ I will not tell you that he was a good father ; you 
all know that he is dead from having loved his daugh- 
ter too well.’ ” 

“ Alas ! would to Heaven that that were true ! ” 
answered M. Minxit, “but it is a deplorable truth, 
which I can no longer conceal, that my daughter is 
dead because I did not love her enough. My conduct 
toward her has been that of an execrable egoist : she 
loved a nobleman, and I did not wish her to marry him 
because I detested noblemen ; she did not love Benja* 
min, and I wished him to become my son-in-law be- 
cause I loved him. But I hope that God will pardon 
me. We did not make our passions, and our passions 
always govern our reason. We must obey the instincts 
that he has given us, as the duck obeys the imperative 
instinct that takes it toward the river.” 

“ ‘ He was a good son,’ ” continued my uncle. 

“ What do you know about it ? ” answered M. Minxit. 
“That is the way in which epitaphs and funeral ora- 
tions are made. Those paths that run through our 
cemeteries lined with graves and cypresses are like the 
columns of a newspaper, — full of lies and falsehood. 
The fact is that I never knew either my father or my 
mother, and it is not clearly demonstrated that I was 


MY UNCLE BENJAMIN. 


273 


born of tlie union of a man and a woman ; but I have 
never complained of the abandonment in which I was 
left ; it did not prevent me from making my way, and, 
if I had had a family, perhaps I should not have gone 
so far : a family embarrasses and thwarts you in a thou- 
sand ways ; 3^011 must obey its ideas, and not yours ; 
you are not free to follow jmur vocation, and, in the 
path in which it often throws 3"ou, from the first step 
you find yourself in the mire.” 

“ ‘ He was a good husband,’ ” said my uncle. 

“Indeed, I am not too sure of that,” said M. Minxit; 
“ I married my wife without loving her, and I have 
never loved her much ; but with me she always had her 
own way : when she wanted a dress, she bought one ; 
when a servant displeased her, she discharged him. If 
that is what makes a good husband, so much the better ! 
But I shall soon know what God thinks about it.” 

“ ‘ He has been a good citizen,’ ” said niy uncle : 
“‘you have been witnesses of the zeal with which he 
has labored to spread among the people ideas of reform 
and liberty.’ ” 

“ You can say that now without compromising me.” 

“ ‘ I Avill not say to you that he was a good friend.’ ” 

“ But then what will you say ? ” said M. Minxit. 

“ A little patience,” said Benjamin. “ ‘ His intelli- 
gence has enabled Iiim to win the favor of fortune.’ ” 

“ Not precisely my intelligence,” said M. Minxit, 
“ although mine is as good as another’s ; I have profited 
by the credulity of men; that takes audacity rather 
than intelligence.” 

“ ‘ And his wealth has always been at the service of 
the unfortunate.’ ” 


m 


MY UNCLE benjamin. 


M. Minxit gave a sign of assent. 

“ ‘ He has lived as a philosopher, enjoying life and 
causing those around him to enjoy it, and he has died 
as a philosopher also, surrounded by his friends, after a 
grand feast. Passers-by, drop a flower upon his grave.’ ” 

“ That is pretty nearly right,” said M. Minxit. “ Now, 
gentlemen, let us drink the stirrup-cup, and wish me a 
pleasant journey.” 

He ordered the sergeant to carry him to his bed. My 
uncle wanted to follow him, but he was opposed to it, 
and insisted that they should remain at table until the 
following day. 

An hour later he sent for Benjamin. The latter 
hurried to his bedside ; M. Minxit had only time to 
take his hand, and then expired. 

The next morning Monsieur Minxit’s coffin, sur- 
rounded by his friends and followed by along procession 
of peasants, was about to leave the house. 

The priest presented himself at the door, and ordered 
the bearers to take the body to the churchyard. 

“ But,” said my uncle, “ it is not to the churchyard 
that M. Minxit intends to go ; he is going to his field, 
and no one has a right to prevent it.” 

The priest objected that the remains of a Christian 
could rest only in consecrated ground. 

“ Is the ground to which we carry M. Minxit less 
consecrated than yours? Do not the flowers and the 
grass grow there as well as in the churchyard ? ” 

“ Then,” said the priest, “ you wish your friend to be 
damned ? ” 

“ Allow me,” said my uncle : “ M. Minxit has been 
in the presence of God since yesterday, and, unless his 


^TY TTNCLE BENJAMIK. 


275 


case has been postponed a week, be is now judged. In 
case be bas been damned, it will not be your funeral 
ceremony that will revoke his sentence, and, in case he 
bas been saved, of what use will the ceremony be ? ” 

The priest cried that Benjamin was an impious man, 
and ordered the peasants to leave. All obeyed, and the 
bearers themselves were disposed to follow their ex- 
ample ; but my uncle drew bis sword and said : 

“ The bearers have been paid to carry the body to its 
last resting-place, and they must earn their money. If 
they perform their task well, each shall have his pay : 
if, on the contrary, one of them refuses to go, I will 
beat him with the flat of my sword till he falls to the 
ground.” 

The bearers, even more frightened by Benjamin’s 
threats than by the priest’s, made up their mind to 
march, and M. Minxit was laid in his grave with all the 
formalities that Benjamin had indicated. 

On his return from the funeral, my uncle had an 
income of ten thousand francs. Perhaps we shall see 
later what use he made of his fortune. 


THE Eiiri). 


APPENDIX. 


CLAUDE TILLIER.* 

At the beginning of the fifties, while I was saunter- 
ing through Paris one day and standing before one of 
those itinerant news stalls that exhibit their wares on the 
ramparts of the quais and under the archways of the 
houses, my eyes caught sight of a stitched volume, of 
damaged appearance. No cover, no title-page, no pref- 
ace, neither author nor printer, — nothing but a dirty 
title pasted on with the three words : 3Ion Oncle Ben- 
jamin. I do not know what attraction these three 
words had for me, but they seemed to look at me in a 
friendly way, as if to say : “ Only turn the leaves, you 
will not regret it.” I was not long to be entreated, and, 
indeed, scarcely had I hurried through a few pages 
when both style and contents began to fascinate me in 
such a degree that I bought the book for a few sous and 
put it in my pocket. Then I went to the Luxembourg 
garden, took a seat beneath a chestnut tree, and did not 
rise again until I had read the book to the end. 

For a long time no book had yielded me such deep 
satisfaction ; but by whom was it ? The simple, con- 
cise, and direct style seemed to be that of the eighteenth 
century ; the narrative, so natural and without reserve 
and circumlocution, recalled Voltaire, Diderot, and Le 

•This sketch of Claude Tillier’s life and works is translated from the 
German of Ludwig Pfau by George Schumm. 


276 


' appendix. 


Sage ; the genuine feeling for nature and mankind 
maybe also conveyed a suggestion of the sentimentalism 
of Rousseau. But the whole manner of expression was 
more spontaneous, popular, and richer in color; and 
even if the author had not introduced himself as a grand- 
child of that generation, the spirit of liberty and equal- 
ity that permeates his book betrayed too much of modern 
thought not to have lain at the breasts of the Revolu- 
tion. Moreover, in spite of all that family resemblance, 
the character of the author was so independent, his 
humor so peculiar, as to permit of explanation only by 
the individuality of the man. 

Greatly as I was delighted, therefore, by the beauty 
of the book, greater almost was my astonishment to find 
its author so entirely forgotten. How came it that a 
man of such talent was not in everybody’s mouth ? How 
could a writer who so easily wins the sympathies of the 
reader remain wholly in concealment? For a long time 
I made vain inquiry among litterateurs and the trade, 
until I finally succeeded in discovering the traces of my 
Great Unknown, who in the meantime, to be sure, has 
acquired a certain popularity. I secured the four vol- 
umes of his writings that were published at Nevers in 
1846, and learned now that his name was Claude Tillier, 
that he had lived in the province, died in the province, 
and was therefore being ignored by Paris. 

Claude Tillier is probably the only highly-gifted 
French writer of this century who could decide to play 
his modest part in the obscurity of a small town. A child 
of the Revolution, he was born on the 21st of Germinal in 
the year IX. of the republic, or on the 10th of April, 
1801, in Clamecy, a small town in the department of 


278 


APPENDIX. 


Ni^vre. His father was a locksmith. Already as a boy 
he was wont to take the part of the weaker in the fights 
of his comrades and oppose the stronger. In conse- 
quence of this pernicious inclination he came home one 
day with a broken arm. But his talents ke^^t equal 
pace with his courage, and he so distinguished himself 
while at school as to win the town scholarship of Cla- 
mecy in 1813 among numerous competitors. With this 
assistance he completed his studies at the lyceum of 
Bourges. 

During the first Restoration, Claude, the child of the 
Revolution, who, as he himself saj^s, drank his mother’s 
milk out of the field-flasks of the daughters of the regi- 
ment, rebelled against the new order of things. Placing 
himself at the head of a riot at school, he met the shout: 
Vive le roi! with the exclamation : Vive V empereur ! He 
tore up the white cockade and wrote his mother an en- 
thusiastic letter, which later fell into hostile hands and 
shut him out from the career of a public instructor dur- 
ing the second Restoration. 

Completing his studies in 1819, Tillier left the col- 
lege of Bourges. He now became an assistant teacher, 
first at the college of Saissons, and later at a boarding 
school in Paris. In 1821 he was drawn into military 
service and obliged to take part in the campaign of 
1823 as subaltern of the artillery. The son of liberty, 
he must march in favor of the Holy Alliance against 
the Spaniards ! After passing six years, full of disgust 
and weariness, in military service (where, moreover, he 
laid the seeds of the lung trouble that was to prove 
fatal), he returned home in November, 1828. He be- 
came teacher of the communal school and got married. 


APPENDIX. 


279 


Now Tillier begins to attract attention as a writer; 
he becomes a zealous contributor to a small opposition 
paper that was founded in Clamecy in 1831 under the 
title, “ L’lnd^pendant.” Not satisfied with teaching 
the young, he wishes also to instruct the old. But 
people unwilling to learn prove unfriendly towards 
those who give them lessons, and they revenged them- 
selves on the writer at the expense of the schoolmaster. 
His opponents moved, in public meeting, to appoint a 
second principal, and to divide the salary between the 
two. Tillier defended himself with his “ hard and 
pointed weapons,” as he himself calls them. He sub- 
mitted a remonstrance to the common council, in which 
he brought out the incongruity of the proposition in a 
humorous way, by comparing the union of two teachers 
to a double team consisting of a horse and a donkey. 
But, tired of the squabble, he finally consented to the 
discharge of the horse, and left the vehicle to the other 
companion. The police court, however, took the part 
of the donkey, and the unharnessed schoolmaster had 
to atone for the directness of his speech with eight days’ 
imprisonment. 

Tillier now founded a private school, which was 
originally well attended. But the antagonisms that led 
to the catastrophe of 1848, the dissensions between a 
rotten bourgeoisie that had shared the spoils of 1830 
with royalism and the outraged people who had gained 
nothing, were at that time coming to a head. True to 
himself, Tillier took the part of the oppressed, and soon 
the whole camp of corruption — official robe, cowl, and 
money-bag — had entered into a conspiracy against him. 
These natural enemies of every free and noble character 


280 


APPENDIX. 


strove to cut the poor schoolmaster off from the eco- 
nomic means of life. Political hatred and religious per- 
secution placed themselves in ambush to draw away his 
pupils. Fatted bourgeois and fanatical confessors be- 
labored the fathers and terrified the mothers until the 
private school more and more melted away. 

But as it ever happens that tho evil principle incurs 
its own defeat by its victory, so also Tillier was urged 
on to his literary calling by these persecutions, and his 
mighty pen dealt the reactionaries far severer and more 
effective blows than his teacher’s rod could ever have 
done. In 1840 he published his first pamphlet under 
the title : “ A Raftsman, to the Common Council of 
Clamecy.” This was followed by the “ Letters on Elec- 
toral Reform,” which appeared in the “ National.” In 
1841 there was already such a good ring to his name 
that he received a call to Nevers to assume the editorial 
chair of the journal, “ L’ Association.” Here he wrote 
for the feuilleton two stories : his “ Oncle Benjamin ” 
and “ Belleplante and Cornelius.” The first, a charm- 
ing sketch of the Nivernese manners and customs of the 
eighteenth century, combines the spiritual freshness of 
Gallic presentation with that German humor that laughs 
through tears, and is in this respect unique in French 
literature. As if in play and by a few strokes, the mas- 
terful description endows a character with flesh and 
blood, and places him, as by magic, in full life before 
the eyes of the reader. Experienced rather than in- 
vented, sprung from the fulness of artistic observation, 
the ‘‘ Oncle Benjamin ” belongs to those favored spirit- 
ual children of which the most fortunate father produces 
but one ; to those rare books which by the delicate — 


APPENDIX. 


281 


because unconscious — blending of the ideal and the 
real become the common property of all times and 
places and pass from generation to generation in eternal 
youth. The other story treats of the joys and suffer- 
ings of the inventor in battle with the commonplace ; it 
is more of a fantastic nature, but rich in beautiful pas- 
sages. 

The “ Association ” finally succumbed to a systematic 
persecution ; but Tillier, although ill, did not lay down 
the pen. He now wrote a first series of twenty-four 
pamphlets, then a second one of twelve. The wealth of 
satirical fire, philosophical humor, and poetical power 
that he spent in these pamphlets is something amazing. 
The elector, the tax-collector, the prefect, the bishop, 
the priest, the professor, the mayor, the miracle-perform- 
ing saint, and the severe beadle, all the half-gods of the 
district, the giants of the country town, must take the 
floor and play their part. But his favorite antagonist, 
his hereditary foe, is the late M. Dupin, president of 
the chamber of the republic and deputy of the July 
revolution and subsequent attorney-general and senator 
of the second empire. Nor can one imagine two more 
complete opposites than these two men; the modest, 
unselfish pamphleteer, full of tenderness and fidelity of 
thought, and the greedy, venal political parasite, shame- 
less and without principle. When this type of corrup- 
tion appears on the scene in his great galoches, the style 
of Tillier also puts on clouted shoes, the better to step 
on the feet of his adversary. The “ Pamphlets ” consti- 
tute a history of the liberal aspirations of the province 
under Louis Philippe ; they furnish a comprehensive 
picture of the struggles and battles which the demo- 


282 


APPENDIX. 


cratic opposition fought in all departments Avith the 
July government. Tillier did not live to see the ap- 
2 )earance of the second series. His lung trouble passed 
into consumption, and so he faded away, pen in hand, 
like a sentinel Avho in his fall still exclaims : “ Com- 
rades, here is the enemy ! ” He died at Nevers, Octo- 
ber 12, 1844, aged forty-three years. 

Such is, in few words, the life — so brief and so full, 
so modest and so meritorious — of a man of genius. As 
child, — a broken arm; as boy, — a rebellion; as youth, 
— a soldier’s fate; as man, — a school-room, then prison, 
persecution, struggle, misery, and finally death ! He 
died poor as he had lived, but, notAvithstanding his pov- 
erty, he frequently made himself responsible for his 
friends and found means, aaIicii necessary, to pay for 
them. The abstemiousness of the philosopher and the 
carelessness of tlie artist constituted the features of his 
character. In all questions Ave find liim on the side of 
truth, liberty, and justice. Whether he attacks the 
superstition and intolerance of an ambitious clergy or 
the selfishness and corruption of a Avealthy hourgeoi%ie ; 
whether he champions the right of suffrage and the lib- 
erty of the press, or Avrites against the dotation of the 
Duke of Nemaurs and in derision of the thig-hbone of 

O 

Sainte Flavia, all these little masterpieces of polemics 
reveal the same Avarm feeling of justice, the same 
liealthy common sense, and the same relentless logic 
that Avill never let go of what it has once seized, and 
Avhich a miracle-performing saint Avill no more escape 
than a royal prince. 

A master of form and abounding in matter, thinker 
and artist, politician and poet, bright and clear, grace- 


APPENDIX. 


283 


fill arid pointed, Claude Tillier is the genuine expres- 
sion of French literature. Born in the centre of an- 
cient Gaul, near the Loire, in the true home of the 
Gallic spirit, on the boundary line between Troubadour 
and Trouvere, he has, like the wine its bouquet, tlie 
peculiar taste of the soil whose product he is. This 
happy zone has brought forth many a writer of precious 
humor, keen intellect, and biting satire ; but notably 
Tillier’s spiritual kinsman, Paul Louis Courier, and 
the father of the pamphlet and of satire, the master of 
Montaigne, Moliere, and Voltaire, the jolly Rabelais. 
Tillier is the legitimate son of this family, and his po- 
lemical writings, which are still read with undiminished 
pleasure, take their place beside the pamphlets of Paul 
Louis Courier. The two countrymen are equals in 
respect to fire and dash, charming nature and artisxic 
skill, wealth of sentiment and power of irony; and, if 
Tillier is sometimes left in the rear by his predecessor 
in the matter of elegance of language and delicacy of 
description, he excels him in point^ of novelty and 
spontaneity, he has the unexpected turn and the sur- 
prising metaphor. Tillier has the frank expression, 
the scent of the country, the spicy strength of the peo- 
ple from whom he sprang; his style overflows with 
sap and force, like the wild tree in the free country. 
“ What do I care,” he remarks somewhere, “ that you 
call a simile trivial, if it is only correct and picturesque, 
if it only embodies the idea and makes it tangible to 
eye and ear? A fine reason, that, to refrain from the 
use of a word because thirty millions of others use it.” 


284 


APPENDIX. 


II. 

Better, however, than any biography do Tillier’s 
writings tell us who and what he was. For as a poet 
of lyrical feeling and plastic power he weaves his life 
into his writings, and gives us, as none else, himself in 
every line. Nothing, for instance, could furnish a 
more realistic picture of the sufferings and struggles 
of his youth than the following description of his life 
as an assistant teacher : 

“ I who jest and laugh with you have passed through 
life’s severest trials. I was pupil, assistant teacher, sol- 
dier, and schoolmaster. With these employments I al- 
ways combined that of the poet. The corporal, the 
school-director, the ill-bred children, the tender mothers, 
and the rhyme were my five inexoxable enemies that pur- 
sued me incessantly. . . . Now I am a pamphleteer, a 
pamphleteer with somewhat pointed tooth and nail by 
whom a number of people carry scars, but I shall never 
say anything so bad of society as it has done to me. 

“ Before 1 got to be a soldier, I was an assistant 
teacher. But of all serving men the most unfortunate 
is without doubt the assistant of a boarding school. 
With terror I recall the miserable state of mind I was 
in when, my certificate in my pocket, I offered my ser- 
vices to those Latin hucksters of the capital who trade 
in the languages of Homer and Virgil. ... I was 
nineteen years old ; suffering early maiked me out for 
her own, and I could not without great difficulty earn 
the piece of bread that easily falls to the lot of every 
beggar. During four weeks I wandered through the 
streets of Paris with my grandmother j we had searched 


APPENDIX. 


285 


the farthest suburbs, we liad , knocked at the doors of 
all institutions known to the guide-board ; but the good 
old woman might say as often as she would: ‘ Claude 
has passed through all the grades, and in philosophy he 
even stood second best ’ — in vain ! My unfortunate 
nineteen years were to blame that I was everywhere 
left on the hands of my grandmother. From door to 
door we were turned away with thunder tones: ‘We 
need nobody.’ A joking principal of a boarding school 
even pretended to consider me as a pupil who was 
being brought him. Finally my grandmother suc- 
ceeded in finding a corner for me in an institute. Ave- 
nue de Lamothe-Piquet. The excellent institute was 
situated between the House of Invalids and the Mili- 
tary Academy, just opposite a school for trained dogs 
that were taught to fetch and carry things and give the 
paw.” 

The neighborhood gave rise to a mistake that Claude 
relates drolly enough. A lady who was looking for the 
dog school for her little quadruped was mistaken by the 
master of the institute for a mother who wanted to 
place her child there. 

“ In this house,” Tillier continues, “ I had my wash- 
ing, board, and lodging in the dormitory of the pupils ; 
in view of my great youth, I was to receive no salary at 
the beginning. I conducted the studies and recitations, 
I watched over the recreation hours, and accompanied 
the pupils on their walks. That was a dearly bought 
morsel of bread. 

“ The proprietor of the institute had nothing to prove 
himself a teacher except his sign. He did not under- 
stand Latin, not even thieves’ Latin. In order to con- 


19 


286 


APPENDIX. 


ceal liis ignorance, lie sought to gain fame as a savant; 
to that end he published “ The Beauties of French His- 
tory,” and was now engaged on the historical beauties 
of other nations. This sort of books were the fashion 
at that time ; every nation was presented with the 
beauties of its history in a duodecimo volume, neither a 
page more nor less. 

“There are persons who will make a fine book out 
of one good page ; there- are others who cannot get up 
even a page with the aid of a whole book. Monsieur 
K. belonged to the latter. He was one of those spirit- 
ual journeymen wdio mutilate rather than abbreviate, 
who take a folio, dissect it, throw away the meat, and 
keep the bones ; one of those scullions of literature who, 
when they pare an apple, leave nothing but the core. 
His beauties of French history gave him the right to 
assume the title of a writer, a title that served that of 
teacher as no mean armament. He passed his days in 
the public libraries in the preparation of extracts, and 
his evenings in the salons of the Faubourg Saint-Ger- 
main, wdiere he Avas admitted in consequence of the 
purity of his royalism. During his absence, the crown 
descended to the female line. The female line ruled in 
the person of ]\Iadame B., a red-haired, pale-faced Eng- 
lishwoman, who had a skin like the shell of a turkey’s 
egg, or like white satin that has for some time been 
exposed to the indignities of flies. The pupils liked 
her very much, because she always maintained that they 
were right ; the assistant teachers despised her just as 
much, because she always said they were wrong. 

“ There were from twenty to twenty-five Englishmen 
in the institute of Monsieur R., whom his wife had 


APPENDIX. 


287 


brought as her dowry, and about as many Frenchmen 
who represented his share. This mixture of two na- 
tionalities constituted the educational system. The 
Englishmen of the wife were to initiate the Frenchmen 
of the master into the language of Byron at the ball 
and other games ; and these were at the same time to 
teach the former the language of Racine. In conse- 
quence of this unfortunate' exchange, the substantives 
had lost their articles, the adjectives their genders, and 
the verbs their conjugations. There arose such a hodge- 
podge of the two languages, such gibberish that, as at 
the tower of Babel, no one any longer understood his 
neighbor. . . . 

“ During the first days that I passed in this house I 
felt terribly unhappy. The loss of liberty was intol- 
erable torture to me. I envied secretly the boot-black 
wdio went by the windows singing and Avhistling. How 
gladly w^ould I have exchanged all my treasures of 
wisdom for his dirty stool and his black hands ! Some- 
times I was almost choked by tears, but I dared not 
cry; I had to await the night to permit myself this 
luxury. Often I said to myself: Why did not my 
father teach me his trade ? Then I should have all I 
need : bread and liberty ; more I have never asked for, 
and here I have neither bread nor liberty. The good 
man had imagined that I must make my way as so 
many others with the help of the education that he had 
given me ; but instead of gold pieces he put counters in 
my purse. I am too simple, too awkward, too ingenu- 
ous to make my fortune in pedagogy. Fortune is like 
the tall trees, only the insect that creeps or the bird 
that flies can build its nest on them. 


288 


APPENDIX, 


“HoAvever, I was only at the beginning of my- 
troubles. After two or three clays my charges had 
lost all respect for my person. Tlie two nations that 
had daily made war upon each other made a truce, 
and combined themselves against me. My gray dress 
coat — a gray dress coat which the best tailor of my 
town had made and which my grandmother had said 
was splendid — was the target of their jests, and often 
even of their missiles. It was useless to punish them 
for it, large and small laughed at my punishments; 
to be kept after school was recreation to them, for I had 
to preside. Again and again I was tempted to take 
instant and summary revenge on these impudent and, 
in their practical jokes, so cruel fellows. But if I were 
sent away, what should I do ? How should I meet my 
parents, who believed me to be on the road to success ? 
And even if I had wished to come to this decision, how 
should I pay my seat on the stage coach ? I was liter- 
ally Avithout a penny. My family granted me a 
monthly allowance of five francs, which came to me 
through my grandmother ; but these five francs I had 
long ago spent in rolls and bretzels that I ate on my 
Avalks, for I was always hungry.” 

But at last poor Tillier lost his patience anyivay, 
and, after he had one day deservedly whipped an inso- 
lent young Englishman, he Avas obliged to leave the 
institute in the fall of 1820. 

“ I had settled Avith Monsieur B.,” he continues. 
“ There Avere still coming to me tAventy-tAvo francs and 
ten centimes Avhich he gave me. They leaped into my 
pocket. My tra2)s Avere soon together. My Avhole 
trunk consisted of an old neckerchief tied together by 


APPENDIX. 


289 


tlie four corners, and contained more scribbled paper 
than linen. An old stump of a cigar that was hidden 
in my pocket came accidentally into my hands. It 
seemed to me becoming to depart with the cigar in my 
mouth. I lit it in the kitchen and marched proudly 
over the yard, like a garrison that leaves the fortress 
all covered with military glory. At the large gate 
stood a boy who seemed to be waiting for some one. 
This young pupil had been my neighbor at the table in 
the workroom, and I had often helped him in his tasks. 
As soon as he saw me coming, he came running up to 
me and extended some square-looking object wrapped 
in paper to me. 

“ ‘ I beg you. Monsieur Claude, take this ; it is vanilla 
chocolate. I know you have not earned much at 
Monsieur R.’s. That will make a few breakfasts. Do 
not fear you are robbing me ; Christmas is at hand, 
mamma will give me some more chocolate, and per- 
haps nobody will give anything to you.’ 

“ This unexpected manifestation of tender affection 
embarrassed me. I am possessed of a very foolish ex- 
citability, and my emotions, once aroused, lack all self- 
control. Instead of expressing my thanks to this lov- 
able boy, I began to cry like a donkey. In the mean- 
time he attempted to force the package into my coat- 
pocket, and I — blinded by tears, choked by sobs, 
unable to speak — tried to stay his hands, but in vain. 
As soon as the chocolate was in my pocket, the dear 
little rogue took his flight like a bird that is chased 
from one bush into another. A short distance from me 
he stopped : 

‘‘‘Monsieur Claude,’ he cried, ‘if you will promise 


290 


APPEm)IX. 


me to keep the chocolate, I will come to you again ; I 
have something more to say to you.’ 

“ ‘ O dear little felloAV, I promise you, I will always 
keep it in memory of , our friendship.’ 

“ He came back and took both my hands. 

“ ‘ Now you must promise me further that you will 
let me know what institute you will enter. I don’t 
like Monsieur R., because he is a royalist, nor Madame 
R., because she is an Englishwoman ; but you I loved 
from th§ first hour, I don’t know why, and I will en- 
treat mamma so long to take me to you until she con- 
sents.’ 

“ ‘ Well, my child, I Avill promise you also that.’ 

“And as I took my hands out of his, I fled to the 
street, for I felt that I was again to be overcome by 
crying. At some distance I saw my friend standing on 
the terrace. He was looking after me Avith eyes that 
Avere surely filled Avith tears. 

“ AfterAvard I forgot this child. I Avas unfeeling 
enough to eat his chocolate Avithout notifying him of the 
institute I had entered. I have forgotten him, as the 
Avanderer forgets the tree under Avhich he rested for a 
moment on his journey through the desert. This poor, 
deceased love, here it lies in a corner of my heart under 
some rose-colored crape ; for it is the fate of man to 
forget. At the bottom of every human heart lies, ah ! 
a little heap of ashes and dross. Our soul is a church- 
yard full of graves and inscriptions, a bed Avhere 
young blossoms strike their roots in dead flowers. 
Oblivion is a blessing of God, for if man, Avhile round 
about him all is changing and passing aAvay, had not 
the faculty of oblivion, he Avould be the unhappiest 


APPENDIX. 


291 


of all creatures, liis life ■would be one perpetual pain, 
and liis eye an inexhaustible well of tears.’’ 

The sorrows of the assistant are followed by the 
tortures of the schoolmaster. The vivid description of 
them furnishes at the same time an intimation of the 
struggles Tillier had to wage with the clergy. He 
writes : 

“Which of us earns the more honest bread, 5mu 
bishops or we schoolmasters ? In the midst of a troop 
of children from morn till night who yelp like a pack 
of hounds, we wrack ourselves to set in motion the 
cumbersome, rusty machine called the school, and 
spend our energy, like the wood-chopper who drives 
a wedge into a block of wood, by forcing letters and 
syllables into the bard heads of children, and ruin our 
health by repeating tiresome explanations a hundred 
times. The poor road-mender can put aside his shovel 
for a moment in order to press the hand of an old 
acquaintance who is passing along; the brick-layer on 
the scaffolding turns his head in the direction of the 
street and looks a long time after a girl whom he has 
given a friendly nod ; the locksmith, while pulling up 
and down his bellows, dreams of his home and of the 
day of his return ; the tailor, sewing his coat, discovers 
in a fold of the cloth a merry song that he hums again 
and again, as the peasant jingles a gold piece that he 
wishes to test. But we, we must stand guard over our 
head like a sentinel over his post ; we must inexorably 
turn away from us every dream, every memory, every 
wish ; we must see and speak at the same time, restrain 
this one, spur on that one, preserve order here, call out 
the spirit of industry there ; in short, we must do the 


292 


APPEISTDIX. 


work of three. Some of us are magnificently gifted, 
but if their spirit wishes to soar into higher regions^ 
they must nail their pinions to the desk; they have a 
golden tool and must break stones with it. And you, 
you bishops, what are you doing meanwhile? You 
preach from your pulpit, you promenade like little gods 
under a canopy, you let Levites flatter you, or you even 
banish some old priest out of his congenial parish. 
For this arduous labor the government pays you ten 
thousand francs a year, but you are not of the kind to 
content yourself with anything so small. You make a 
journey every year, and when you have travelled a 
hundred miles or so, you return, weary and exhausted, 
into your palace to rest yourself, and for this toilsome 
trouble you ask no less than two thousand francs’ 
‘ ti'avelling fees,’ Ah ! how many of us- would count 
themselves overhappy if they received for the hard 
labor of a year only one-half of what you earn in eight 
days by breakfasting, dining, and triumphal proces- 
sions. 

“ Do you perhaps claim that your abilities merit such 
grand rewards? But who tells you that a bishop 
requires more brains than a schoolmaster? A good 
teacher must know everything, even a little theology; 
but a bishop, what does he need to know except a 
little theology ? Honestly, don’t you think something 
more is needed for a good arithmetician or a good 
grammarian than for the manufacture of holy oils? 
I will wager that the person of Monsieur Dnpin con- 
tains enough material for ten bishops; but I deny that 
a single schoolmaster could be made out of him. Or 
do you even claim that the size of your salary is deter- 


APPENDIX. 


298 


mined bj the utility of your works ? This would be a 
second self-delusion ; in this respect also we have the 
advantage. For four months the diocese was without a 
bishop, and nobody noticed it. The bells tolled, masses 
were read, women went to confession now as before; 
there was only a priest less in the city, and since the 
return of His Eminence there is one more, that is all. 
But if the diocese should be four months without a 
/ schoolmaster, do you think that would be immaterial, 
too? Do not, therefore, reproach us again by saying 
that we give instruction to earn money, for, you see, 
we are capable of answering you.” 

HI. 

In the following picture of Dupin, Tillier furnishes 
splendid proof of the power of his pen and the penetra- 
tion of his thought. When he sketched it in the begin- 
ning of the forties, this professional renegade stood in 
the zenith of his glory and was the idol of the depart- 
ment. To-day nobody any longer doubts the likeness 
of the picture : 

“Verily, I say to you. Monsieur Dupin, there is a 
certain species of egotism that would even make a great 
man ridiculous : namely, that shameless and garrulous 
egotism that forever and ever prates of itself, that 
would monopolize the attention of the entire world, 
and write its name upon every wall. You, Monsieur 
Dupin, are the most perfect type of this sort of egotism. 
You love money, you love it with a measureless passion, 
you love it as well as the law permits it to be loved? 
and yet there is one thing that you love still more, and 
the more so the more it is denied you, and that thing 


294 


APPENDIX. 


is popularity. As the people fail you, you have made 
yourself a people out of the bourgeoisie. You need 
people who are well-dressed, well-shaven, well-brushed, 
well-polished, and who continually run up and down 
stairs. You need newspapers that are forever on the 
alert and exclaim every moment ; ‘ O, the great man I ’ 
To live obscurely would mean to you not to live. If 
one should discover some luminous article that could 
shed its radiance over a circumference of from two to 
three miles, you would have to get a piece of it for a 
wide dress-coat, and if every yard should cost a law- 
suit. 

“You have an insatiable craving to shine. Wherever 
there are compliments to reap, you rush in instantly. 
There can be no festivity in Clamecy but what you ap- 
pear, clad in your wide dress-coat, majestically escorted 
by firemen. Should the king of Monaco attend one of 
these ostentatious festivities, he could but exclaim : 
‘ Upon my honor, if I were not king of Monaco, I would 
be Monsieur Dupin ! ’ 

“Certain simple. folks imagine that you harbor an 
implacable hatred against me who committed the blas- 
phemy of defaming your great name, that hatred which 
never vanishes, but, like the dagger of the savage, 
eternally preserves its poison. These people do not 
know you. Your mortal enemy. Monsieur Dupin, is 
he who appears not to notice your importance and who 
basely curtails you of the required attention. You 
would much rather hear it said: ‘This is Monsieur 
Dupin, the lickspittle, the counsel of all abuses, the 
defender of all wrongs ; Monsieur Dupin, the turncoat, 
who deserted the camp of the people under a great 


APPENDIX. 295 

flourish of trumpets’ — than, ‘Who is this old gentle- 
man ? ’ 

“You have that voracious appetite for flattery which, 
without nicety of choice, devours everything that is 
thrown at it : youdhink more of quantity than quality. 
It would require large bells to execute tlie serenade 
that would truly delight you. There is a shoemaker in 
Clamecy, a ridiculous poetaster whom everybody de- 
rides. Nine out of every ten lines of the doggerel 
which the lame muse of this Apollo of the last welds 
together are addressed to the great Diipin, ‘the king of 
orators.’ While awaiting your return, he has always a 
poem on his last and a wreath in his tub. And you, 
the academician, who are accustomed, moreover, to the 
gilded flatteries of the court, you pride yourself with 
this crown as if it were of roses and laurels. The fetid 
incense that he wafts towards you is sweet perfume to 
you ; you wear the disgraceful mark of his praises on 
your forehead as if it were the most precious jewel of 
popularity. And to complete the bargain you send him 
your addresses for his pathos I . 

“ I will tell you what you are. Monsieur Dupin : 
above all you are a Dupinian. You belong to no party, 
you resemble those marshes between two rivers that 
are neither land nor water, but treacherous quicksand. 
You may now throw aside your honest man’s mask ; 
your hypocritical sturdiness no longer deceives any one. 
You are not the peasant of the Morvan, you are the 
fawner upon ministers at court. You take off your 
iron-bound laced shoes in order to walk on the polished 
floors of the salons. You are a lion that offers his 
paw. 


296 


APPENDIX. 


“You were a liberal when you were young, if you 
really ever were young. But liberty was only a poor 
grisette, who lavished all the wealth of her love on you 
while you were plotting a marriage for money with a 
lady of high degree, royalty. Had the Restoration 
lasted longer, you would have turned to her. Half 
bourgeois^ half nobleman, half prelate, half minister, we 
should haye seen you figure in a ministry of reconcilia- 
tion. The Restoration was awaiting you. . . . 

“ You have in turn attacked and defended the same 
people, ^ou danced now on the right foot, n.ow on 
the left. You placed yourself as a hyphen between 
progress and the reaction. You expected j)eople would 
regard your instability of principle as a sign of inde- 
pendence of character, and say : ‘ Monsieur Dupin rec- 
ognizes no master save his own conscience i he extols 
the good and rebukes evil wherever he meets it, regard- 
less of party.’ But the art of your dissimulation Avore 
too clumsy galoches to sneak in unawares, and people 
simply said: ‘Monsieur Dupin wishes to enjoy at one 
and the same time the rewards of servility and- the 
honors of independence.’ From time to time you antag- 
onized the ministers, but your opposition was so gentle 
that it reminded me of the tactics of your old school- 
master, who used to punish his favorite pupils Avith a 
goose-quill. It reminded me of the valorous deeds of 
those bears Avhich, trained to sham-fighting, seize the 
dogs of their masters betAveen their paAvs as if they 
Avould crush them, and suffer them to run away after 
pulling out a feAV hairs. 

“No, if I Avere the electorate, I should not have any- 
thing to do with a delegate who occupies two seats. I 


APPENDIX. 


29T 


should say to you : ‘ Monsieur Dupin, are you the friend, 
the foe, or the accomplice of the government? You do 
not wish to submit your creed in order not to limit 
your independence? Well, then, Monsieur Dupin, 
you remain mayor of Gacogne 1 ’ 

“You have exerted a lamentable influence on the 
district of Clamecy, Monsieur Dupin. Your protection 
has killed every noble aspiration in its shadow. Our 
young people got to be calculating old men in their 
twentieth year. We came to be accustomed not to 
engage in any political work without first asking our- 
selves what you, the public conscience of the district, 
would say of it. The fear of incurring your ill-will 
and the hope of winning your applause have been our 
sole guide for ten years. You have raised among us 
the most pernicious spirit of selfishness and intrigue. 
Out of our honest fat ciphers you have made State par- 
asites and office seekers. Blockheads were sent to 
high schools because in the mist of the future people 
discerned your hand, ready to guide and to provide. 
People married the daughters of your servants, in order 
to gain your protection as dowry, and you paid the 
dowry. Your recommendation took the place of ac- 
quired rights and replaced virtue and capacity. Integ- 
rity that appeared without your marginal notes was 
basely turned away from the door. The talent that 
your fingers did not plant on a candlestick was suffered 
to miserably perish under the bushel. You were 
looked upon as the providence of the town. Favors, 
official positions, advantages, everything came to us 
out of your hands. Presently we should have en- 
treated you for rain and sunshine; and if you had 


298 


APPENDIX. 


wanted an altar in the church of Clamecy, the common 
council would. have built two for you. 

“ But what use have you made of your influence, 
Monsieur Dupin? How have you distributed your 
favors among the crowd of petitioners who daily made 
a show of their pretended misery before your door, and 
whom I used to call the poor of Monsieur Dupin ? It 
is just a^ if you had intentionally selected the very 
worst. Let us look at some of your favorites at ran- 
dom. There is, for instance, — .but, no ! You would 
make me run the gauntlet of your laws, Avhich in cer- 
tain cases punish truth for libel. ... 

“This revolution — that was taking place by your 
side, without you, and perhaps in spite of you — you 
have despoiled of the better part of the booty, washed 
it clean of blood, and distributed it among your creat- 
ures. O, Monsieur Dupin, will we be burdened much 
longer by the public calamity of your influence? I 
think not. Since your last address, you have terribly 
fallen off. You are no longer anything but a smoking 
wick. There is already a certain odor of the peerage 
about you. On the day when the miserable cry : 
‘ Monsieur Dupin will be a peer. Monsieur Dupin is a 
peer ’ ’ echoes through the district like a thunderclap, 
there will be an end of you. You are not the man who 
can make a weapon out of his quill when the platform 
is taken from you. Your speech is good at one time 
and bad at another; but if your tongue should be cut 
out, what would remain of your person? A demone- 
tized gold coin still retains the greater part of its value, 
but a depreciated assignat^ what is that worth. Mon- 
sieur Dupin? In ten years, when our young people 


APPENDIX. 


299 


will ask about the Monsieur Dupin who made such a 
noise in the district, they will find nothing but an old 
pettifogger.” 


What could better reveal the magnanimity of the 
poet and the integrity of the poor man that Tillier 
possessed in so eminent a degree than the following 
passage : 

“ There is unfortunately no law against corruption ; 
undisp)uted we must suffer this public calamity to scat- 
ter down on our cities the infectious miasma out of its 
wide pinions. ... If a soldier should deliver into the 
hands of the Prussians the poorest hamlet on your 
boundary, he would be sentenced to a shameful death; 
but the scoundrels who, to. gratify their greed, sell our 
liberties, violate our contracts, and hold the nation by 
the throat while it is being placed in fetters are re- 
warded with positions of honor and wealth untold. 
According to what rule do you judge of human ac- 
tions ? If treason, instead of a gorget, wears a stand-up 
collar, and a pen behind the ear instead of a sword by 
the side, does it then cease to be treason ? Does crime, 
by merely changing coats, become a virtue? A few 
moss-grown boundary stones — are they of greater 
value in your sight than the law of the land? 

“But however base we esteem venality in general, 
the basest is that of the writer. Those who have a 
voice strong enough to make themselves heard by the 
masses are the natural champions of the noble cause. 
God has loosened their, tongue and commanded them to 
preach the service of liberty. If they prove false to 


300 


APPENDIX. 


their sacred calling, if they, like wicked shepherds, 
lead their flocks to the shambles, they deserve all the 
contempt of which a human soul is capable. That is 
just as if the light-house were to desert the coast that 
it ought to point out to the storm-tossed ship and sta- 
tion itself on a cliff. I am one of the least of those 
who vfrite for the people ; I wield only a wren’s quill ; 
but God forbid that I should ever sell it to our op- 
pressors ! O, no ! and if hunger with his iron fingers 
should tug at my vitals, I would not so degrade myself. 
If I must beg my bread, it shall at least not be in the 
ante-chambers of the ministers. Rather would I recite 
my pamphlets from door to door and hold out my hand 
to those who have a heart for liberty and the people. 
And surely calmer dreams would visit me on my straw 
than many another on his silken couch. 

“ Between the icy steppes of poverty and the weari- 
some Eden of wealth where heaven eternally reflects 
the same blue and the earth the same green lies a tem- 
perate zone where want and superfluity alike are un- 
known. Here the soil yields nothing to the weakling 
who will not till it ; but whoever digs a furrow is sure 
of a rich harvest. Under these changeful skies there 
are indeed gloomy and rainy days, but often also the sun 
smiles mildly and gloriously through the rifts of the 
clouds. Here I have pitched my modest tent between 
two blooming bushes. I am perfectly contented on this 
spot, and have no-’ desire to leave it. My wants are 
few and my stomach is small. Since a little rib is suffi- 
cient to fill it, why should I mortgage myself to a 
butcher in order to have a leg ? . . . Great ladies I do 
not frequent, my dress eosts me very little conse- 


APPENDIX. 


801 


quently, and theirs costs me nothing at all. I hold 
that a garment in the closets does not serve as clothing, 
and so my entire wardrobe consists of a great coat of 
agreeable thickness for winter and of a thin coat for 
the mild days of the pleasant season. I try to make 
these garments last as long as possible ; and it con- 
cerns me very little if fashion looks at me askance 
when I mfeet her. My respect does not suffer thereby 
among those who know me, and the rest may think 
what they like about it. When I am saluted, I can at 
least feel assured that the salute is not meant for my 
coat. . . . 

“ Should you appeal to my fatherly feelings, I will 
answer you that I love my children with all my heart, 
but that. I cannot sell my conscience in order to enrich 
them. Besides, I have not placed them in the world 
that they should grow rich ; it would vex me if they 
should. Their cradle was made of willows, and it is 
not necessary that their death-bed should be carved of 
mahogany. We Tilliers, we are made of the hard, 
knotty wood of which the poor people are made. My 
two grandfathers were poor, my father was poor, I am 
poor; my children shall not depart from their kind. 
If my son should take a notion to accumulate wealth, 
my enraged shade would rise uj) before him and throw 
his money-bags out of the window. And do not im- 
agine I am exaggerating ; for I tell you : the lame old 
cobbler who mends shoes in yonder street corner and 
whom you despise earns his bread more honestly than 
the loftiest plumed crest among our great lords or the 
weightiest money-bag among our skilful financiers. 

“ And, moreover, why should I trouble myself about 


302 


APPENDIX. 


the lot of my children ? When my last coughing fit 
has come, when my quill together with my soul has 
returned to God, will the sun darken then and the 
earth cease growing green? The All-Father who sup- 
plies the young of the birds with food, will he deny it 
to the little ones of the pamphleteer? My parents 
gave me nothing, and I am grateful to them for it ; had 
they given me much, I should perhaps not dare to sign 
their name to my pamphlets. When I left the paternal 
roof, I had not even a calling. I fell into this world 
like a leaf that the storm shakes from the tree and 
rolls along the highway. But I did not lose courage : 
I always hoped that out of the wdngs of some bird 
sweeping the skies a quill would fall down, fitted to my 
fingers, and I have not been disappointed. The rich 
man is a plant that springs from the earth fall-grown 
in leaf and flower. I was a poor grain cast among 
thorns; with bleeding head I raised the hard shells 
that were oppressing me and forced my way towards 
the sum Why should not the modest blades that I, 
leave on my root-stalk grow as I grew? Instead of 
selling myself to the powerful, I made war upon those 
who sold themselves to them, and I do not regret it. 
That is, after all, the best road to an honorable grave. 
Of that I am convinced ; and if this my pamphleteer’s 
quill should grow out of my grave, and my son had 
the cunning to use it, I should urge him to grasp it, 
even if he should meet a prison in the middle of his 
course. When one can say to himself : the oppressor 
fears you and the oppressor puts his trust in you — 
that is the noblest riches, riches for which I would 
willingly give all else. 


APPENDIX. 


303 


“ And of what avail if I, like those gentlemen, were 
one of the most important philistines in my small 
town ? A fine honor to be the thickest stalk of aspara- 
gus in a bunch or the largest radish in a basket-full ! 
I cannot Avalk on stilts, and in order to rise above the 
heads of the rest,T will not get on a muck-heap. Who- 
ever desires to be proud must at least know why ; but 
these philistines who with their thick paunches put on 
such great airs, what are they proud of ? They do not 
know it themselves, and those who take off their hats 
so slavishly before them do not know it either. These 
gentlemen despise the people and consider themselves 
therefore as half noblemen ; but they are only butter- 
flies that despise .caterpillars. . . . 

“ And, moreover, man is not born alone to live, but 
also to die. Who of us would not cast a glance be- 
hind the dark curtain that brings our existence to a 
close ? All that dies leaves a trace of its life ; when 
the wii^d is dispersed in space, the leaves still tremble 
wliich it has kissed ; when the wild thyme is crushed 
between the great jaws of the ox, it still leaves its fra- 
grance in the meadow for a time ; when the string of 
a violin snaps asunder under the rude strokes of the 
bow, its vibrating ends still emit a sibilant sound. But 
all the people who bartered away their conscience — 
when the last sound of the bells that toll them to the 
grave has died away ; wlten the silver-paper tears that 
have been shed over them are laid away in their bier ; 
when the smoke of the thundering guns that offer the 
last salute to what is mortal in them has cleared away, 
— what remains of them? A disgraceful memory and 
a dishonored name, something like the stench that sur- 


304 


APPENDIX. 


vives an extinguished candle. After their flatterers 
will come the people whom they have betrayed, and 
spit on their tomb. But I, if I have neither a marble 
slab nor gilded letters on my coffin, I wish at least that 
the modest hillock that shall cover it may spread a 
sweet perfume; and, haply, when a pious duty shall 
lead the friend of liberty into the garden of the dead, 
he will go a few graves farther and salute my 
shade.” . . . 

And again : 

“The name pamphleteer that you hurl at me as 
something opprobrious, I take it up and wear it as a 
badge of honor. To tell people the truth is, notwith- 
standing all your talk, a noble calling. What does it 
concern me if a couple of old crickets and two or three 
barnbeetles that have lost their teeth angrily buzz at 
me in their little rage ? I am conscious of having put 
to good use what small portion of* reason God gave me. 
I am rather at peace with myself than with others, and 
my self-respect is of greater value to me than that of a 
whole troop of jackanapes who neither know nor under- 
stand me. 

“With what can they reproach me as a writer? I 
have always taken the part of the weak against the 
strong ; I have always lived beneath the tattered tents 
of the conquered and slept by their hard bivouac. It is 
true, I have cancelled a number of too pompous adjec- 
tives which certain names had appropriated to them- 
selves; and now and then I have also pricked the 
bubble of some bloated self-conceit. But the persons 
whom I have treated so were on the side of the enemy, 
and I had a right to explode their airs. I did not 


APPENDIX. 


305 


violate the law of war against them ; and if they com- 
plain about me, it is just as if an old soldier of the 
empire should complain because he was wounded at 
Austerlitz by a Frenchman. Call it personalities — 
what of it? Every one has his own way - of making 
war : the others shoot into the masses at half the height 
of a man; but I select my man and take a good aim.. 
But if a' plumed crest happens to pass by my door, I 
always give him the preference. 

“ My name is lost among the many which the great 
city daily rolls in its wide mouth ; but nevertheless I 
flatter myself that my pen is not useless. The hedge is 
low, and its branches hang into the grass ; but with its 
thorns it pricks the wrong-doer who would trespass 
upon strange premises ; its wild flowers it gives to the 
shepherdess who passes by the way, and the little birds 
build their nest with security in its branches. I would 
rather be a law-protecting hedge than a tall useless tree. 
A shameful employment, that of the penny-a-liner who 
sells to the powers that be an old duster of a quill with 
which no scrub woman would sweep away the ashes in 
the stove, and who for a handful of money lives a life 
of falsehood and lies. I should indeed not like to be in 
his place. 

“ I am, then, a writer of pamphlets ; but am I indeed 
so godless as the black-coated gentry would like to 
have their pious souls believe? According to their 
religion, may be ; but not according to the religion of 
God. Would the supreme judge, if I were to appear 
before his tribunal to-morrow, have so very much to 
hold up against me? I did not fill my hands with 
gold ; I did not sell my thoughts. I gave them to the 


306 


APPENDIX. 


people, whole and unalloyed, as the tree gives them its 
fruits. I took my daily bread out of God’s hand, with- 
out ever asking for more. If this bread is black, I do 
not complain ; if it is white, I eat it with a good appe- 
tite ; but black or white, I never let anything remain 
over for the coming day. I go straight ahead, without 
looking backwards or forwards; only the stone before 
my feet I seek to avoid, and in this, too, I do not 
always succeed. If I see some weed on my way, I pull 
it up by the roots; if I find a good grain, I dig a hole 
in the earth and plant it there; if it does not come 
forth for me, it will yet grow for some one else. I do 
as the butterfly that enjoys itself during the summer 
without thinking of the winter, and that does not dream 
of building itself a nest for the few days it will remain 
on earth. I advise my children to do as I do. I will 
them my example : that is, after all, the best riches, for 
which they will at least not have to pay any inheritance 
tax. I do not pray, for the reason that God knows 
better than I what he must do ; because I might ask 
things of him that would not be good for me ; and 
because without our asking he lets the sun rise every 
morning and the earth bring forth fruit and herbs 
every year, for, if he has created us, he is also bound 
to care for our maintenance. He cannot b^e like those 
wretched fathers who place their children before the 
doors of foundling hospitals. Nor do I adore him, 
because he does not need adoration, and the worship 
that the masses offer him is nothing but the flattery of 
selfish creatures who want to enter paradise. But if I 
have a penny to spare, I give it to the poor. 

“ I have said what I am ; may those now who call me 


APPENDIX. 307 

godless tell us just as sincerely what they are, and we 
shall soon see that they are less religious than I.” 

V. 

Nothing can give us a better idea of the fortitude 
and strength of soul of the poor sufferer than the fol- 
lowing passage, full of mockery and resignation, with 
which Tillier laughed death in the face.; The Mon- 
sieur Gaume mentioned here is an abb^, who had 
brought the thigh-bone of Sainte Flavia from Rome to 
Nevers for his bishop, Monsieur Duf^tre, and who 
thereby challenged the scorn and ridicule of the pam- 
phleteer : 

“In the congregation of Monsieur Gaume,” writes 
Tillier, “ a schism has broken out on my account ; for 
a portion of the virgins declare that, struck by the 
avenging thigh-bone of Sainte Flavia, I am about to 
die ; but another, more impatient portion claim that I 
have already died, that I am as dead as a rat, and even 
buried. Very well, then, I am about to die ; that is 
possible. It is indeed long since the years of youth, 
these beautiful birds of passage whom winter drives 
away, have flown from me. I have travelled over half 
of my course. I am on the other slope of life, where 
the valleys stretch before us in sombre twilight, where 
the trees have retained hardly a few leaves, and 
where the gray sky is thick with snow-flakes. When 
one has once reached the downward course, the de- 
scent is more like rolling than walking. But that I 
am dead I deny. Besides, my death is a ready-made 
miracle for Sainte Flavia; I may die to-day, or to- 
morrow, or in ten years — nothing will prevent the 


308 


APPENDIX. 


superannuated virgins of Monsieur Gaume from claim- 
ing that their saint killed me. 

“ I confess I was frightened by this threatening an- 
nouncement of my impending doom ; but Claudius, my 
venerable patron saint, appeared before me one night 
recently : 

“ ‘ Do not fear, my dear Claude,’ he said to me, ‘ the 
Lord Christ has read your pamphlets, and he liked 
them very much, and if he does not become a sub- 
scriber to them, it is only because he would not like to 
offend M. Dufetre. You are the defender of religion, 
and its enemies are those Jesuits who shape and util- 
ize it to their own advantage as if it were their prop- 
erty. You are coughing, I know, I hear up yonder 
how you cough, and, without meaning to flatter you, I 
can say that you cough pretty well. But don’t take 
any of that medicine, that’s poor stuff ; go early to bed, 
rise late, and drink the wholesome country air ; I do 
not claim that this diet will cure you. I am not one of 
those empirical saints who pursue the art of healing as 
if they had to live by it. But if this Flavia touches 
your chest, she shall learn to know a Claude : with a 
single stroke of my crosier I will break that thigh-bone 
of hers into a thousand pieces.’ 

“ ‘ Dear patron,’ I answered him, ‘ is your crosier per- 
haps loaded with lead ? But in any case, you cannot 
mean to wield it against a woman ? ’ 

“ ‘ A woman,’ he answered me, ‘ a woman ! Is mal- 
ice invulnerable, then, as soon as it is coupled with 
weakness? And you yourself, Claude, although you 
are a whole-souled Claude, do you hesitate to kill the 
fly that has stung you for the simple reason that you 
are stronger than it ? ’ ” 


APPENDIX. 


309 

The warmth of his feeling, the tenderness of his 
heart, how powerfully they burst forth once more in 
these last lines which he wrote on his death-bed : 

“ My mother stands beside my invalid’s chair ; she is 
deaf, poor woman, and my voice is weak; we can 
hardly make ourselves understood. But she is here, 
she envelopes me in her glances, she seeks to read in 
my eyes what I want, she can divine by the smallest 
fold on my forehead what I dislike. She has left the 
other half of her family, the half that can spare her ; 
she wishes to have her part of my death-struggle. The 
same care that once watched over my childhood she 
now bestows on my early old age. One son she has 
already seen dying, and now she comes to lend me also 
the support of her arm and to lead me gently down the 
slope of life. . . . 

“ Poor mother ! with what heavy hand did God 
measure out the tears that he stored beneath your 
lids ? Or is God unjust to the mothers ? A son can 
only once bury his mother ; but a mother, how many 
sons may she mourn ! Am I at least the last child she 
must bury ? Will a last one remain to close her eyes 
and lay her dear body beside our bones? Or must 
it be her lot to take the key of our poor house with 
her? . . . 

“ Ah ! how much less am I to be commiserated than 
she ! . . . I die a few days before my schoolmates, but I 
die at that age when youth is nearing its end and life 
is but a long decay. Unimpaired I return to God the 
gifts with which he intrusted me ; free my thought 
still soars through space, time could not bleach the 
feathers of his wings. ... I am like the tree that is cut 


810 


APPENDIX. 


clown and still bears fruit on the old trunk amidst the 
young shoots that come after. Pale, beautiful autumn ! 
this year thou hast not seen me on thy paths that are 
fringed with fading flowers ; thy mild sun, thy spicy air 
have refreshed me only through my window ; but we 
depart together ! With the last leaf of the poplar, with 
the last flower of the meadow, with the last song of the 
birds I wish .to die, aye, with all that is beautiful in the 
space of the year ; may the first breath of frost call me 
away! Happy he who dies young and need not grow 
old!” 

This farewell requires no rhymes to be a poem; 
poetry has not created anything more touching and 
more genuine. Rarely do we find a combination of so 
much lyrical charm and so much polemical power and 
logical rigor as in the writings of Tillier. But his works 
reflect his character. He was one of those beautiful 
natures of native nobility, who rise out of the depth of 
society, and who, in spite of temptation and misery, 
pass unsullied through the filth of life. Wholly of the 
third estate and of the people, he loved liberty passion- 
ately and battled for her heroically on the remote out- 
post that accident had intrusted to him. Regardless of 
personal matters, he lived for his idea and found his 
reward in himself. Unselfishness was his virtue and 
human dignity his religion. 

After I had learned to know this knightly figure by 
his writiugs, I determined to revive his memory among 
my countrymen. I visited his sunken grave, held out 
my hand to his pensive shade, and spoke to him: 
“ Here you rest now, quietly and forsaken, under your 
modest sod, brave champion ! And six feet of earth is 


AppENDi:^:. 


811 


all that death gave yo-u after life denied you so much. 
I, too, am an exiled disciple of liberty, travelling along 
your paths and come for devotion to your grave. 
Slumber on in your ungrateful earth, disinherited one ! 
I, the refugee, will erect a monument to you in my 
home. I will translate your ‘ Benjamin,’ who resembles 
you in noble pride and true love of man, into a lan- 
guage that appeals to forty millions of hearts; and 
your portrait, you faithful counsellor of the oppressed, 
I will exhibit it among my countrymen, for you are the 
true man of the people whom all nations recognize^ as 
their own. — Look you, our enemies consider us as poor 
in wealth and as weak in power ; but we are rich in 
the spirit and strong of will, and we are their masters 
by the might of wisdom. The fools ! They do not 
know that above them an eternal law holds sway and 
that its mighty spirit is leading the world gently, but 
irresistibly, towards our goal: the liberation of the 
human race, the reign of justice. They do not see the 
foot-prints of his progress, they do not hear the verdicts 
of his tribunal ; but to us, his messengers, he appears in 
all his glory, saying : ‘ Do not complain ! I am with 
you ; and instead of the things of time I promise you 
the things of eternity. See these poor, they pride 
themselves on their spoils and — nothing is their in- 
heritance ; for their deed is without seed and their 
bequest without heirs, they are in the service of decay. 
But you are the workers of the resurrection, your work 
grows from generation to generation and has eternal 
life.’ — Sleep on, then, with your honors, your poor 
grave will outlive their marble vaults. Let them glis- 
ten and glitter, let them mock and deride, the unjust ; 


312 


APPEKDIX. 


their soul Avill vanish without a trace, like the stalk 
that bears no fruit ; but you, chosen one, you will live 
among the living. Your brain sleeps and rests, but 
your thought is awake and working. You have dug 
your furrow in the field of time ; many a harvest will 
come and go, and none will erase it. Thousands of 
spirits will receive you, thousands of hearts will bless 
you ! ” 


SOMESTHIKTG- NTES'VST' 

IN TRAIN EQUIPMENT 

For Patrons of 





Between the Twin 
Cities and 


CHIC^G-O. 


The Limited Train on this Line, Leaving Minneapoiis 
7.25 P. M. and St. Paui 8.05 P. M. for 
Chicago, is now equipped with 



These Cars are 
furnished with 
luxurious Easy 
Chairs, Tables, 
Writing Desks 
and well selected 
Library. They 
are also supplied 
with latest Illus- 
trated Weeklies, 
Puck, Judge, 
Harper’s Leslie’s 
etc. and the Buf- 
fet has full equip- 
ment for serving 
light refresh- 
ments. 



The equipment of this Limited is not surpassed, 
not even on the oldest roads of the East or In America. * 


NO EXTRA FARE IS CHARGED 

on this train but the privileges of Buffet-Smoking Car 
are for exclusive use of Sleeping Car Passengers. 


Secure Tickets via The North-Western Line. 


For Copy of Illustrated Folder — Free 

Address 

T. W. TEASDALE, 

General Passenger Agent, St. Paul, Minn. 


LBJe’2': 




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